Jamie Babbit is probably best known for her breakout film "But I'm a Cheerleader" but the writer/director has also had much success with TV, having directed multiple episodes for shows such as "Gilmore Girls," "Nip/Tuck," "Malcolm in the Middle" and "Alias."

Her independent feature "The Quiet" opens in theaters wide this weekend with an all-star cast comprising of Elisha Cuthbert ("The Girl Next Door," "24"), Camilla Belle ("When a Stranger Calls"), Martin Donovan ("weeds"), Edie Falco ("The Sopranos") and Shawn Ashmore ("X-Men: The Last Stand"). The movie tells the story of an orphaned deaf-mute girl named Dot (Belle) who moves into a seemingly normal surburban family. But the truth about her new home slowly unravels itself, and their deepest, darkest secrets speak volumes as she struggles to adapt to her surroundings.

Jamie talks to Cinema Confidential in an interview below.

Q: How did the project come to you?

JAMIE: I was given the script by an actor that was in "But I'm a Cheerleader." My inspiration was that I read the script. He had two friends who wrote it. They had written this script called "Dot" at the time and it had been at the Sundance Screenwriters Lab and they were looking for a director. I read the script, well the first ten pages, and I called him and said, "You know what Joel? I don't want to do another high school cheerleader movie, I've already done that." He said, "No, no no, it's not a high school cheerleader movie. Keep reading; you have two more pages and everything changes." So I said, " O.K." and I kept reading and the first revelation kind of happened, the first twist, and then more twists and more twists. It just was a very different kind of movie than what I had expected.

I was really interested in the whole idea of sexual abuse and how that plays out in a family. I happened to have friends growing up who suffered with that. I also liked the idea that the movie was a lot about how girls trade secrets in friendship and exploit their secrets and the barter system of secrets that girls tend to deal more with than boys, especially in the teen years. The way that girls become friends is by trading secrets, and in that way they can also be more cruel than boys because they have these secrets to hold over each other. I thought there was a lot of interesting things going on in the movie. It also combined two genres that I love: suburban horror and female revenge movies. It had both of those elements so I came on board to direct.

Q: Why was the title changed from "Dot" to "The Quiet"?

JAMIE: T I liked that title ["The Quiet"] because I thought it spoke more to all the characters in the film, not that they were isolated but that they had these secrets. I liked that it was a kind of…it gave the movie more of an ensemble feel rather than it was just "Dot," the deaf mute character. That's where the change come from.

Q: Were Elisha and Camilla the first choices you had in mind for the lead roles?

JAMIE: The original casting I had, Elisha wanted to play Dot. I didn't think she was right for the role. I said, "Dot's supposed to be invisible and I can't think of a single school in the world in which you could walk in and be invisible because you're one of the beautiful women I've ever seen in my life." The original role of Dot was given to Thora Birch but a week before shooting, she pulled out so I had to find a Dot quickly. I had just seen "The Ballad of Jack and Rose" and thought Camilla would be perfect for Dot.

Q: Did Elisha see this as a darker side to the character she plays in "The Girl Next Door"?

JAMIE: Certainly a lot of women who work in the sex industry have dealt a lot with sexual abuse, and I think a lot of victims of sexual abuse would say that when you deal with sexual abuse, nudity, sexual performance and hsowing yourself sexually becomes very mundane. You'd rather get paid, you have to do it against your will and you feel more empowered now, you'd rather have control of it later in your life. Maybe it's like the independent film version of "The Girl Next Door."

Q: Camilla has a tough challenge in that she has to act with her face and emotions rather than words. How did you go about directing her in those scenarios?

JAMIE: The great thing about Camilla is that she's so natural. She's a very natural actress and has a very luminescent skin. She has a great look. She had to learn sign language so we had an organization called CODA (Children of Death Adults) and we had a woman come in and teach her sign language. We worked a lot on making her seem invisible. Some actors came in and auditioned early for the role before Thora got involved and some people "over-emoted" because they felt since she wasn't speaking, they had to really show it on their face and it was actually a disaster because she's trying to be invisible. The more subtle, the better and Camilla is a subtle actress.

Q: How difficult was it to fund a movie like this?

JAMIE: I got involved with the script. Then, I got it out to agents to get cast attached, then Elisha came on board first and that's why she receives a producer credit on the film, because she really helped to get the money for the movie by putting her name on the film. And so with Elisha's name on the film along with Thora Birch, we got it to the University of Texas, who had just decided they wanted to start financing films. And because of the cast and because of the insight of the creator of that program, she liked the script, liked the cast, and she liked me, so she decided to come on board. She's a brave woman and she wants to make an independent film and some people will say, "Why did you make a movie about incest, especially in Texas?" She said, "Well, Medea is incest, incest is in the bible, it's an old story, it's relevant, and we need to talk about it, and we're making art films and this is something we can do."

Q: What's next for you?

JAMIE: I directed another movie in February called the "Itty Bitty Titty Committee," which is a follow up to "But I'm a Cheerleader." It's a lesbian movie about a girl who doesn't really have a purpose in life, and she happens to meet a band of revolutionary feminists and changes the world.  

"The Quiet" opens wide in theaters this week.