Witherspoon takes dramatic turn

LOS ANGELES -- Before her latest film, if anyone had asked Reese Witherspoon what the term "extraordinary rendition" meant, she might have answered with a blank stare.

The words could be bureaucratese for something as innocuous as a tax deduction. But as Witherspoon's "Rendition" spells out darkly and melodramatically, the term actually stands for a U.S. government practice of transferring terrorism suspects to other countries, where their interrogations could subject them to abuse and torture.

"I don't think I realized what the term was called," Witherspoon said. "It sounds like public-policy rigamarole. It doesn't sound like anything that you would connect with the torture and detainment of innocent people."

"Rendition" is the first release for Witherspoon since 2005's "Walk the Line," the Johnny Cash biopic in which she played the country-music legend's wife, June Carter Cash.

Though Witherspoon won the best-actress Academy Award for "Walk the Line," the dramatic turn she takes in "Rendition" may surprise fans of the performer best known for comedies such as "Legally Blonde" and "Sweet Home Alabama."

Actress Reese Witherspoon poses during an interview about her new film, "Rendition," at the Toronto International Film Festival in Toronto, Friday, Sept. 7, 2007. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

In "Rendition," Witherspoon plays the wife of an Egyptian-born man (Omar Metwally) suspected of involvement in a Middle East terrorist bombing who is abducted by U.S. authorities and sent for questioning at a secret facility.

As her character begs for answers from government officials, Witherspoon transforms into a desperate, emotional wreck.

As a master of the light touch, did Witherspoon find it hard to get into the head of a woman in distress?

"I wouldn't say tougher or not tougher," Witherspoon said. "I think it's all the same. You come at it from a character perspective. .... There has to be a part of it where you feel like it could be an experience you could have or someone else could have."