Actor Djimon Hounsou is known for roles in serious dramas including "Blood Diamond" and "Amistad," but he likes to have fun, too.
He stars in the Marvel blockbuster “Guardians of the Galaxy,” in theaters now.
"I play Korath the Pursuer, who is allied to Ronan (Lee Pace) and Thanos (Josh Brolin)," he said during an interview Wednesday to promote his new movie. "It's an action-packed, space-driven story. A dramatic story. I liked the fact that it was so theatrical."
The movie, starring Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Vin Diesel, Bradley Cooper, John C. Reilly, Glenn Close and Benicio Del Toro, concerns an American pilot (Pratt) who becomes the subject of an intergalactic manhunt when he swipes something belonging to Ronan.
“It was such a huge undertaking, given the fact that on a daily basis everyone was going through hours of makeup and then creating a world that doesn’t exist,” Hounsou said. “Some of us completely forgot about the physicality of this story. The costume looks great and makeup looks great and then you realize, ‘Oh goodness, I can’t move much.’”
Having starred in such projects as “Gladiator” and “The Four Feathers,” he understands the appeal of a more lighthearted summertime epic.
“Somewhere internally, we have superhuman notions at times,” he said. “It’s an aspect of trying to escape your daily struggles. You want to get out of your mind, your soothing environment. This allows you to escape and see a world we can only fathom and imagine at times.”
Wednesday’s visit brought Hounsou back to Atlanta, where he was here for “Fast & Furious 7.” He couldn’t say much about that project, only that “I play a mercenary who feels like he has lost something he has to retrieve and those ‘Fast & Furious’ boys have.”
Because of the tight filming schedule, he wasn’t able to spend much leisure time in Atlanta, but he said he’d like to come back for good.
“I always wish I could live here,” he said. “It’s so nice, it’s so green.”
Given the nature of his current project, we asked what power he’d choose if he could. Rather than flight or invisibility or superhuman strength, he’d choose supernatural benevolence: “If I could have the power to alter the world that I live in, that would be great.”
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