“STAR wars” star Daisy Ridley is in talks to take a lead role in the crime thriller “The Ice Beneath Her” for STX Entertainment, The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed.

The movie project, which STX will finance, is based on the 2015 novel by Swedish author Camilla Grebe about a young woman found beheaded in a business tycoon’s marble-lined hallway, a crime that comes to resemble an earlier unsolved killing and quickly develops into a race against time.

Three members of the collective horror filmmaking group Radio Silence — Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, Tyler Gillett and Chad Villella — are on board to direct and produce alongside Andrew Lazar (“American Sniper”). Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett directed the cult genre hit “Ready or Not.”

New Line Cinema was earlier set to adapt the Swedish novel, with STX now also picking up the worldwide distribution rights.

Ridley, a breakout star of 2015’s “Star Wars: The Force Awakens,” also appeared in Fox’s adaptation of “Murder on the Orient Express” and Disney’s “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” and “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.”

“Ready or Not” mixed horror and comedy as it grossed US$57 million at the worldwide box office on a US$6 million budget. The collective, which also made segments for popular horror anthology “V/H/S” and “Southbound,” is also developing an untitled bear-centric horror comedy described as “Good Boys” meets “The Revenant.”

STX is known for films like “Bad Moms,” “I Feel Pretty,” “Hustlers” and “The Gentlemen.” The company last week said it agreed to a stock-for-stock merger with India’s Bollywood movie major Eros International to create a combined film and television firm, titled Eros STX Global Corp., and to release 40 feature films in 2020.                  (SD-Agencies)