Los Angeles, Jun 26 (IANS): Actress Scarlett Johansson has replaced Samantha Morton in director Spike Jonze's upcoming drama film.

Morton had already completed work on her role as the voice of an operating system, but the filmmaker subsequently decided to take the project in a different direction and hired Johansson, reports Vulture.com.

"I think, unfortunately, it's pretty normal in terms of my not-quite-painless-for-everyone-involved 'process' of discovering what the movie is. Samantha was with us on set and was amazing," Jonze said in a statement.

"It was only in post production, when we started editing, that we realised that what the character/movie needed was different from what Samantha and I had created together. So we recast and since then Scarlett has taken over that role," he added.

The director insists he is very fond of Morton and that he will collaborate with her in future.

"I love Samantha. I've been friends with her forever and I hope we make lots of things together in the future," he said.