We know Jay Baruchel as an amiable presence in Knocked Up, Tropic Thunder and Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist. He'll shortly be seen in She's Out of My League and heard in How to Train Your Dragon. But according to an interview at the AV Club, that career path is just a temporary detour.

According to Jay, in between being a child star and his return to the screen via the patronage of the likes of Cameron Crowe and Judd Apatow, "I was researching film schools, because all I've ever wanted to do is direct horror films in Montreal for the rest of my life. That is the endgame. That is the ultimate motivation. Everything I do is an effort to get to that point. Acting is a way to afford me the opportunity to get to kill people on camera."

Citing fellow Canadian David Cronenberg as his greatest hero, the first step on his path to directordom will, he hopes, happen in the next year or so. The horror debut he's currently working on "is kind of a re-imagining of a slasher film about a crazy white cop who chases four black kids throughout the ghetto on July 4th."

Judgement Night anyone? There's no mention of a name for the project in AV Club's piece, but Bloody Disgusting seem confident it's called Pig (Cypress Hill fans, altogether! "This pig harassed the whole neighbourhood; this pig worked at the station...")

"It’ll be subversive and controversial and polarizing," says Baruchel (and that's just the title!). "That’s what’s best in horror, the movies that do that to people."