— Geoff Boucher

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Three "people" fly near Manhattan in a promotion for the movie "Chronicle." (YouTube)

It takes a lot to grab New Yorkers’ attention these days, but a viral promotion for the upcoming superpowers movie “Chronicle” certainly met that requirement.

Over the course of three days last week, some otherwise jaded city-dwellers caught sight of what appeared to be three people flying over the city, performing silent aerial ballets. It could have been a scene straight from an issue of a Marvel comic, but in fact it was a promotion for the Twentieth Century Fox superhero flick about three friends attempting to cope with newly acquired superpowers. The movie opens Friday.

The “people” were the size of actual humans, around 70 inches high, but upon closer inspection they were people-shaped flying devices created from Dacron polyester, carbon fiber rods and model airplane engines each weighing about three and a half pounds. And while there was one major mishap — one of the flying people had to be rescued from the Hudson River by the NYC Harbor Patrol — the stunt went off without a hitch. Even in a city made skittish by unexpected things in the sky.

“There were a lot of questions,” says James Percelay, who masterminded the flights along with partner Michael Krivicka and their viral marketing firm, Thinkmodo, for Fox. “Tons of calls to New York media. But they were just questioning. They move slowly and they look like people. Nobody felt threatened. No one was concerned by it. They were fascinated.”

The team practiced in a field on Long Island before the six actual flights for the video that included a spin around the Statue of Liberty, the Brooklyn Bridge and off the southern tip of Manhattan.

The flights were just four or five minutes because of the short battery life of the flyers’ on-board motors. But Percelay promises more flights to come in the days ahead at undisclosed locations.

–Patrick Kevin Day

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Michael Nathanson in Oscar-nominated short "Time Freak." (Credit: Sebastian Piras)

How great would it be to turn back the clock, peek into the homes of this year’s Oscar contenders and watch their real-time reaction to the nominations announcement? That’s part of the public fascination with a “you-are-there” video made by Andrew Bowler and Gigi Causey, a husband-and-wife filmmaking duo who are now Oscar nominees in the live-action short category thanks to “Time Freak.”

The shorts nominees were were announced online Tuesday at 5:50 a.m. and Bowler and Causey’s natural reaction to the nerve-wracking wait was to turn on the cameras. When they actually got nominated, their Tuesday video experiment became a time capsule to share with friends and family but it went well beyond that once it hit the echo chamber of the Internet.

“We put [the YouTube video link] on Facebook for friends and family, but the weirdest thing happened – somebody submitted it to ‘Good Morning America,’ and it was [Friday’s] play of the day,” Causey said. “I don’t watch ‘GMA,’ so I didn’t think anything of it, but when I got up in the morning, my phone was full of texts from friends saying, ‘We saw you on ‘Good Morning America!’”

The reaction video — and, of course, the Oscar nomination — has stirred up plenty of interest in “Time Freak,” the 11-minute tale of an amateur scientist who invents a time-travel machine with dreams of visiting ancient Rome – instead he’s sidetracked, neurotically revisiting his recent actions, getting stuck in his own yesterday. Learn more about the film on our sister blog, 24 Frames.

That theme of regret in Bowler’s script for “Time Freak” was actually what motivated the couple to take the gamble of financing the film. Shortly after getting married, they originally were saving up for an apartment in New York City, but when Bowler began writing the short’s script, they decided to put their savings elsewhere.

“Andrew got inspired and wrote this script about a guy who is neurotically consumed with his regret,” Causey said. “We loved this script, and thought, ‘Do we ever want to be in this position of regret and not pursue our dream?’ We just said, ‘We gotta make this movie.’”

The film that came out of their apartment savings is one that is in many ways inspired by favorite time travel movies like “Back to the Future” and “Primer,” but Bowler and Causey don’t see always see eye-to-eye on sci-fi.

Bowler is a huge sci-fi fan (and beyond excited to have the Feb. 21 “Shorts!” Academy symposium be moderated by Brad Bird, director of “The Incredibles” and “Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol”), but Causey doesn’t share the same enthusiasm.

“I’m not a real connoisseur of sci-fi,” she said. “I’m a bigger fan of human stories. But sometimes when the sci-fi element is there, I’ll be drawn to all the humanity in it.”

Bowler admits to tricking Causey into watching sci-fi on a few occasions, including with indie time-travel movie “Primer,” which captivated her more for its psychological thriller elements than its sci-fi roots.

“I’m always trying to pull her in,” Bowler said. “She is always a bigger fan [of a movie] when she doesn’t know she’s watching sci-fi, so I won’t tell her the premise.”

Now with Oscar night less than a month away, the couple have to decide who to bring to the Oscars. As nominees, Bowler and Causey each get a pair of tickets. After doing the math, “Time Freak” star Michael Nathanson is pretty confident he’ll be going to the big event.

Bowler said, “We told Michael Nathanson [about the nomination], and he said, ‘I am so happy I made a short film with a husband and wife team and you have two extra tickets to spare. If you weren’t married to each other, I wouldn’t be going to the Oscars.’”

Bowler is now working on a feature-length version of “Time Freak.” “Time Freak,” along with other shorts nominated for the 84th Academy Awards, will screen in over 200 theaters starting Feb. 10. The film will also be available for purchase on iTunes on Feb. 21.

– Emily Rome

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* At all RealD theaters, the Darth Maul glasses you see above will be handed out (while supplies last) to fans who buy tickets on the movie’s opening day. And now, you don’t have to break them in half at the end of the movie. 

* At all AMC Theaters, fans will get the all-new Hasbro “Star Wars” Fighter Pod with the purchase of each RealD 3-D ticket for “Episode I,” all weekend long, Feb. 10-12.  The limit is one per ticket and the offer is good only while supplies last.

* At 10 select AMC theaters in the U.S., starting at 11 a.m. Feb. 11, there will be special events, interactive fun and giveaways. At those sites, fans can expect a Lego feature area, Darth Maul face painting, character appearances, special pod-racer 3-D glasses, a demonstration of the upcoming Xbox Kinnect “Star Wars” game and a Hasbro collectible toy giveaway. The sites: Atlanta: AMC Southlake 24; Boston: AMC Loews Liberty Tree Mall 20; Chicago: AMC South Barrington 30; Denver: AMC Highlands Ranch 24; Los Angeles: AMC Tustin 14 at The District; AMC Ontario Mills 30; New York: AMC Empire 25; New Jersey: AMC Garden State 16; Phoenix: AMC Mesa Grand 24; San Francisco: AMC Emeryville Bay Street 16.

– Geoff Boucher

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If you want to talk heroic history, no one can touch DC and its iconic troika of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman, but these days, in the DC offices in Manhattan and Burbank, there’s never been less glowing talk about tradition — this is a company that believes its very survival depends on finding the future, finding it fast and taking the risks needed to do so.

The new logo will be hard to miss in the coming months. All the issues of DC Comics that hit shelves in March will have the publishing arm’s version of the new-look symbol and, that same month, DC Entertainment will unveil its massive new website, which one executive described as the “one-stop, be-all online location for everything DC Entertainment.” And, presumably, this is the logo that will flash on the screen this summer right before the biggest film of the year, “The Dark Knight Rises,” takes movie-goers back to Gotham City.

The logo was designed by Landor & Associates, whose client list includes FedEx, Volkswagen, Old Spice, Juicy Couture and, believe it or not, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.  Nicolas Aparicio,  the executive director at Landor’s San Francisco office, says “the new identity is built for the digital age, and can easily be animated and customized to take full advantage of the interactivity offered across all media platforms.” The logo is also a public manifestation of the internal churn at DC; it’s a fresh new flag following a internal revolution of corporate culture.

In early 2010, there was a a sense in the company that publishing trends, audience tastes and Hollywood momentum were all working against it. It was rival Marvel that had the aura of innovation in publishing (where it was No. 1 in market share) and in Hollywood (where nimble Marvel Studios showed a flair for getting a wider array of characters on the screen in bankable franchises that could interlock). Certainly,  Christopher Nolan’s “The Dark Knight” was a colossal reminder of what DC properties could do in the right hands, but “The Losers” and ”Jonah Hex” were reminders that Warners couldn’t deliver a DC blockbuster without Nolan’s name on it.

DC Entertainment President Diane Nelson and Chief Creative Officer of DC Entertainment Geoff Johns at Warner Bros. in Burbank. ( Liz O. Baylen / Los Angeles Times )

Warner Bros., DC’s corporate parent, made a yearlong reorganization of DC Entertainment, putting a new team in charge of the brand’s Hollywood projects and making a shift toward the West Coast. Then came the boldest move of all with The New 52, a seismic jolt to the DC comic book line that restarted every title with a new No. 1. When the new logo was announced, John Rood, the executive vice president of sales, marketing and business development for DC Entertainment, connected some of the dots.

“It’s a new era at DC Entertainment and the new look reflects a dynamic, bold approach while at the same time celebrates the company’s rich heritage and robust portfolio of characters,” he said. “It was just a few months ago that Superman, Batman and many of our other superheroes were updated when we launched DC Comics – the New 52 — and now it’s time to do the same for the company’s identity while remaining true to the power of storytelling which is still at the heart of DC Entertainment.”

DC Comics co-publishers Dan DiDio, left, and Jim Lee. (Mariah Tauger/Los Angeles Times)

Symbols and identity have a lot of mojo in the world of superheroes — who could imagine Superman without his red “S” or his Clark Kent day job? — but DC has to also prove it has special powers.

In a revealing survey of comics retailers, Vaneta Rogers of Newsarama found that The New 52 created the obvious (and massive) two-month spike in sales but also seems to have earned a readership foothold for some of the top titles. For many observers, meanwhile, the jury is still out on digital comics and their future upside, but DC has high hopes in that arena. Trickiest of all, though, is Hollywood, where Nolan is leaving Batman behind. Despite all of Warner Bros.’ willpower (and their galaxy-class commitment to toy-shelf tie-ins and licensing), “Green Lantern” was a bitter disappointment for the new DC team. Now they are focusing on next year’s “Man of Steel” and a slate of television ventures.

And, yes, only time will tell if they can make it all fly…

– Geoff  Boucher

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Guillermo del Toro (Jay Clendenin/Los Angeles Times)

When nominations were announced this week for the 84th Academy Awards, the most fascinating — and startling — category was animated feature film. “The Adventures of Tintin” – which won the Golden Globe in that category – wasn’t nominated at all. Instead, Gore Verbinski’s old West adventure “Rango” made the list, as did two international entries — “Chico & Rita” and “A Cat in Paris” – that present vibrant adventures with a classic hand-drawn approach. Rounding out the category were two DreamWorks Animation releases, “Puss in Boots” and “Kung Fu Panda 2,” and don’t think for a minute that went over well at the Emeryville headquarters of Pixar. “Cars 2″ didn’t win over critics but there was still hope that it would bring home the automatic Oscar nomination that has become a Pixar tradition. No one was happier about the nominations than Guillermo del Toro, who is now working closely with DreamWorks Animation on its projects. Our Geoff Boucher chatted with him in the days leading up to the nominations.

GB: It must have been satisfying for you to watch the success story of the two big DreamWorks Animation releases, “Kung Fu Panda 2″ and “Puss in Boots” – as a consultant on the first and very active executive producer on the second. Would you say the deal you have with the company represents a new career chapter for you?

GDT: In many, many ways, yes. With “Puss,” I was really feeling like part of the team creating it. With “Panda,” I was very involved but I also came in late enough in the process that a lot of the decisions had been made. On “Puss in Boots,” I felt like one of the many parents that the movie has. Every experience I’ve had at DreamWorks has been really rewarding in terms of how they connect with the audience. Following “Kung Fu Panda 2,” all of the audience test screenings and seeing it get a really strong foothold and then “Puss” also getting the CinemaScore [grade of A-] that it got and getting the critical consensus that it got — all of that is hugely satisfying. With both there was the requisite notions of a sequel — or a prequel — but we wanted in both cases to some degree to establish the personality of the movie individually.

"Puss in Boots" (DreamWorks Animation)

GB: On the surface, either movie could have been perceived as a money-grab — with “Puss in Boots,” a spin-off film from a franchise like “Shrek” could easily be pretty watered down by the time it reached the screen. I imagine the challenge was proving the cynics wrong.

GDT: From the beginning the director, Chris Miller, and his team were very clear that they wanted to create a different universe and not have it be, in any possible way, a spin-off from the “Shrek” universe. The reference of Sergio Leone and the idea of making the fantasy elements really, really earnest and beautiful set it apart. We have the ironic things – like Humpty — but, for example, traveling through the magic beans and the beanstalk and into the  giant’s castle is a genuine, bona fide, hard-core fantasy sequence. It was really quite gorgeous and not ironic at all. There are elements in the movie too, that are emotionally counter-intuitive to Hollywood animated films [of this size and type], like having a villain with a real complexity and personality who ultimately finds his redemption instead of, you know, just being killed off. Those things, on the outside they may seem like small steps but to me they are huge.

GB: We heard your voice in the film too,  the parts of Moustache Man and Comandante. Can you talk about that side of the job?

GDT: Well, I make voices in all my movies; I do creature voices in every movie I make — “Pan’s Labyrinth, ” “Hellboy,” “Hellboy 2,” ”Mimic.” In every movie I play a monster, here and there.  I did some dubbing when I was young as an actor in Mexico. [In "Puss"] we used my voice as a scratch track at first but everybody got used to it and we ended up using it for good.

GB: In this digital era we’re seeing the accepted definitions of animation and live-action really blur in interesting ways. It’s also interesting to see directors like Gore Verbinski and Steven Spielberg go into animation and people like Andrew Stanton and Brad Bird cross in the other direction. Give us some of your thoughts on the churn of the scene today.

GDT: As you know I’m a big believer in transmedia and part of the things that I hold is that this sort of permeable membrane between digital and animated filmmaking and live-action filmmaking needs to become this blurry for miracles to occur in genre films – I’m talking about big, audience-oriented films [of fantasy and sci-fi] and you’ll see that frontier continue to be blurry because the digital tools are becoming more user-friendly and more necessary for the delivery of the big action sequences, creatures and effects.

"Kung Fu Panda 2" (DreamWorks Animation)

GB: It’s intriguing to watch the way the technology can be used so differently in different hands. Watching “Tintin” was to see Spielberg’s sense of velocity and action construction fly off in new directions and in “Hugo” I felt as a viewer that Martin Scorsese was bringing a unique deftness to the use of 3D. As a fan of film, it feels like there’s new frontiers being mapped.

GDT: It does, and Bad Robot and J.J. Abrams released that iPhone application to put special effects in your iPhone. More and more on YouTube you’re seeing almost-professional level or professional-level special effects being done by people on their computers for nothing more than creating a viral video or things like that. The line is blurred by that and the line is blurred by the flexibility of video game engines. But I do think it will only affect big-budget genre movies, I don’t think it will affect the way rest of cinema is done.

GB: I have to ask, I know you have your hands full with “Pacific Rim,” but your history with “The Hobbit” is such an unusual one; “The Hobbit” trailer is out now and I was wondering if stirred up a strange mix of emotions for you?

GDT:  You know, not really, not at this stage. I’m very happy the movie is in the right hands and I’m very to happy see — I’m actually elated to see images. I think it’s great to see the trailer. Think about it, I’m so fully immersed now in “Pacific Rim.” I’m 47 and I never in my life have had as good an experience making a movie as “Pacific Rim” has been. It’s been a joy every morning from every point of view and I cannot tell you how much I’m enjoying it because I have nothing to compare it to. Part of it is how involved and invested the guys from ILM have been. It’s been amazing.

– Geoff Boucher

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"Justice League: Doom" (Warner Home Video)

“Justice League: Doom” will make its West Coast premiere on Feb. 16 with a Hero Complex screening at the Paley Center in Beverly Hills with a limited number of free tickets available for fans.

Hero Complex lead writer Geoff Boucher will moderate a Q&A with the filmmakers and members of the cast after the screening.

“Justice League: Doom,” the latest DC Universe animated original movie from Warner Home Video, takes its core plot from Mark Waid’s memorable “Tower of Babel” story arc (which was published back in 2000 in the pages of DC Comics) although there are considerable differences. In both the comics and film, the world’s greatest heroes are all placed in danger when villains get their hands on Batman’s secret files — which indexes the weaknesses of all his teammates and precise tactical plans for taking them down.

"Justice League: Doom" (Warner Home Video)

The film features Nathan Fillion (“Castle”) as Green Lantern, Tim Daly (“Private Practice”) as Superman, Kevin Conroy (“Batman: The Animated Series”) as Batman, Michael Rosenbaum (“Smallville”) as Flash, Susan Eisenberg (“Superman/Batman: Apocalypse”) as Wonder Woman, Carl Lumbly (“Alias”) as Martian Manhunter and Bumper Robinson (“A Different World”) as Cyborg.  As for the bad guys, there are three alumni of the “Justice League” animated series: Phil Morris as Vandal Savage, Olivia d’Abo as Star Sapphire, and Alexis Denisof as Mirror Master. There’s also Carlos Alazraqui (“Reno 911″) as Bane, Paul Blackthorne (“The Dresden Files”) as Metallo and Claudia Black (“Farscape”) as Cheetah.  David Kaufman (“Danny Phantom”) also reprises his “Justice League” role of Jimmy Olsen.

The filmmaking team includes executive producer Bruce Timm, director Lauren Montgomery, producer Alan Burnett and dialogue/casting director Andrea Romano. “Justice League: Doom” also represents the final DC Universe film script from the late Dwayne McDuffie.

"Justice League: Doom" (Warner Home Video)

“Justice League: Doom” arrives Feb. 28 as a Blu-Ray Combo Pack or as a DVD; it will also be available On Demand and via download.

To be first to hear about other Hero Complex screenings, follow us on Twitter: @LATherocomplex.

To learn more about the Paley Center, check out their website.

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"Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind" began as a manga, but Hayao Miyazaki's story became incredibly popular, and an animated film was released in 1984. Nausicaä, a brave, glider-flying princess, lives in a valley with strong winds that protect its inhabitants from a sea of toxic spores and giant insects. When a warship crashes in the valley and invades Nausicaä's home, she sets out to prevent war and find a solution to the ecological crisis. (Studio Ghibli)

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Miyazaki's love of flight is explored in "Castle in the Sky," a lush fantasy about a young boy and girl who battle air pirates in a quest to find a mysterious floating island. (Studio Ghibli)

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The furry monster from Miyazaki's "My Neighbor Totoro" is available everywhere as a stuffed animal, making it the most visible symbol of Ghibli's marketing prowess. This is Miyazaki's Mickey Mouse. (Studio Ghibli)

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"Porco Rosso," released in 1992, follows its title character, a daredevil bounty hunter, who acquired his porcine, if bogartian, alter ego after losing his friends in wartime. Porco pilots his beautiful red seaplane high above the Adriatic while a beautiful nightclub singer waits below. (Studio Ghibli)

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"Ocean Waves" was a TV movie that was the first Studio Ghibli film to not be directed by Miyazaki or Takahata. Ghibli attempted to make a film about a high school love triangle, that could be done cheaply with all the animators in their 20s and 30s.

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The 1994 film "Pom Poko" chronicles a group of tanuki, raccoon-like creatures from Japanese folklore who possess skills of illusion that allow them to shape-shift. The tanuki mount a resistance when their forest home is threatened by suburban development. (Studio Ghibli)

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"Princess Mononoke" (1997) tells the story of a young man afflicted with a curse that gives him extraordinary power on the battlefield but will lead to his eventual death. This lush fantasy follows his quest to stop the curse from claiming his life. (Studio Ghibli)

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A teenage girl's struggle to become independent is the central theme of "Kiki's Delivery Service." Miyazaki's film follows a 13-year-old witch in training whose sole talent is her ability to fly her broom.

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The breakout hit "Spirited Away" out-grossed "Titanic" in Japan and won an Oscar for best animated feature. It tells the story of a young girl stranded in a bathhouse for Shinto gods after her parents are turned into pigs. (Studio Ghibli)

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Based on the novel by Diana Wynne Jones, "Howl's Moving Castle" is the story of a teenage girl named Sophie, hexed with an old woman's body, who seeks out handsome wizard Howl in her quest to reverse the curse. (Studio Ghibli)

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Disney and Pixar Chief John Lasseter has called Hayao Miyazaki, the co-founder of Japan’s revered Studio Ghibli, one of the greatest animators of all time.

Starting Thursday, the American Cinematheque is showing 14 examples of his studio’s genre-defying works, including the Oscar-winning “Spirited Away,” the children’s fantasy “My Neighbor Totoro” and the more adult fantasy “Princess Mononoke” (featuring an English-language adaptation by fantasy heavyweight Neil Gaiman) at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood and at the Aero Theatre in Santa Monica.

“There’s a humanity in these films,” said Eric Beckman, whose company GKids put together the current touring retrospective. “Even the fantasy films are based on a real sense of magic and wonder in everyday things. Every tree or blade of grass or rock or animal has this spiritual essence of life.”

Founded in 1985 by Miyazaki, his mentor Isao Takahata and producer Toshio Suzuki, Ghibli’s films are consistent box-office smashes in Japan — out-grossing even James Cameron’s “Titanic.” Miyazaki is seen as something of a Walt Disney figure and the studio has its own whimsical museum, a cross between a fine arts museum and a theme park, in a suburb of Tokyo.

The exact source of Ghibli’s magic is hard to discern at first glance. Like so much of its competition, the studio traffics mostly in lush fantasy and cute furry creatures, but somehow stands apart.

“If you were to ask Miyazaki, he would say the films he makes are not anime,” said Simon Richmond, author of “The Rough Guide to Anime,” who credits “Totoro” as the film that cemented his love of the form. “They’re animation films. They’re very distinct from the rest of the animation industry in Japan.”

Part of that distinction is in the level of exacting detail put into each film. Up until a few years ago, tricky visual effects were created entirely by hand. (Though Ghibli films use computer aids now, they still retain the hand-drawn look and eschew the slick computer animation style of some Hollywood-style animation).

Legendary animator Hayao Miyazaki photographed at Comic-Con International in San Diego in 2009. (Spencer Weiner / Los Angeles Times)

“I once asked Miyazaki-san if all that effort put into a shot that goes by in a split-second was really worth it,” said former Walt Disney Studios executive Steve Alpert, who handled Ghibli’s overseas division for 15 years and is now semi-retired. “He told me, ‘You may not think you see it, but you feel it.’”

Ghibli’s films can be sprawling and rambling — and that nonlinear structure can be frustrating to some viewers.

Miyazaki’s first major box office success, the pro-environment “Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind,” was severely edited, altered and redubbed and retitled “Warriors of the Wind” for its American release. The story line was unrecognizable to the horrified Miyazaki, and the studio avoided releasing its films in the U.S. for a decade.

Claire Danes provided the voice of San in the American release of "Princess Mononoke" in 1997. (Studio Ghibli)

When producer Harvey Weinstein suggested several edits to “Princess Mononoke” to improve the film’s commercial chances in the U.S. in 1997, Miyazaki’s producer mailed Weinstein a samurai sword with the message, “No cuts.” Weinstein didn’t edit the film.

Although Miyazaki’s films have gained the most notoriety, Takahata’s creations offer their own distinct adult pleasures. His 1991 film “Only Yesterday,” which will have its Los Angeles premiere as part of the Cinematheque retrospective, follows a 27-year-old Tokyo office worker during her vacation in the Japanese countryside and the memories she has of her childhood. Not a giant-fighting robot or a busty girl in a school uniform in sight.

Other Ghibli films on tap include “Porco Rosso,” Miyazaki’s love letter to 20th century flight about a dashing pig aviator and his dogfighting battles in the skies above a post-World War I Europe, and “Pom Poko,” about magical shape-shifting raccoons doing battle with a human construction crew in their forest home.

“These films demand to be seen on the big screen,” Beckman said. The retrospective concludes Feb. 12, but viewers will have another opportunity to catch Ghibli’s spirit on the big screen. On Feb. 17, Disney will release an English-language version of “The Secret World of Arrietty,” an animated adventure based on Mary Norton’s acclaimed children’s book series “The Borrowers,” produced by Studio Ghibli.

– Patrick Kevin Day

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Andy Serkis uses motion-capture gear to play Caesar in "Rise of the Planet of the Apes." (20th Century Fox)

With Academy Award nominations looming Tuesday morning, there’s been a lot of buzz about a possible supporting actor Oscar nod for Andy Serkis, the performance-capture pioneer who played the resistance fighter chimpanzee Caesar in “Rise of the Planet of the Apes.” Serkis, who helped put motion-capture technology on the map a decade ago with his portrayal of Gollum in “The Lord of the Rings” films, received a Critics’ Choice Movie Award nomination for his Caesar performance, and “Apes” co-star James Franco has been campaigning on his behalf for awards recognition. Hero Complex sat down with Serkis earlier this month in a video chat with readers to talk about “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” and his other projects — including Peter Jackson’s upcoming two-part adaptation of “The Hobbit” and Steven Spielberg’s current release, “The Adventures of Tintin” — and what performance-capture technology means for the future of acting, animating and filmmaking. Here are a few highlights from the interview.

On receiving a Critics’ Choice Movie Award nomination and buzz for an Oscar nod: What’s fantastic is that there’s a real growing appreciation for performance-capture technology as a tool for acting. Over the years, people have asked me, “Do you think there should be a separate category for acting in the digital realm? Or hybrid sort of awards for digital characters?” and so on. And I’ve always really maintained that I don’t believe so. I think it should be considered acting, because it is. My part in it, what I do, as say the authorship of the role, the creation, the emotional content of the role, the physicality up until the point of delivering that for the director, it is acting. Getting that nomination for the Critics’ Choice is a significant leap, really, in understanding. Again, this is not taking anything away from the post-production process and what all of those incredibly talented people do, whether they be animators or visual effects artists. This is not taking anything away from them, because their work is accoladed and has been for some time. So for instance, [at the Critics' Choice Movie Awards], “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” won the visual effects award and that’s fantastic, and quite rightly so; the way that those apes are brought to life is extraordinary. What was great about getting a supporting actor nomination is that it clearly shows, it defines an understanding within the industry that it is acting.

On preparing for the role of chimpanzee Caesar: I actually spent a lot of time when I was working on [Peter Jackson's 2005 remake of] “King Kong” studying primate behavior. I had many, many months of working in zoos with gorillas, and then going to Rwanda and studying mountain gorillas in their habitat and so on, and watching a lot of footage. But when it came to apes, to “Rise of the Apes,” obviously he’s a chimpanzee and has a totally different physical vocabulary and behavior. But the most important thing for that was two things really. One was learning chimp behavior… once you’ve established that is the character. So there was another set of parameters which drove finding Caesar, really, and mainly that’s to do with who he is as a being. He’s brought up with a surrogate father who he’s totally loved by. So emotionally, you’re creating a character point of view. Regardless of the fact that he’s an ape, what’s he going through? What’s he feeling? What’s he thinking? The love that he’s brought up with as a youngster is then almost taken away from him when he reaches his age of self-awareness and he’s thrown into this, in effect, hard-core prison. How he copes with that, the free-fall, the feeling like he’s a Frankenstein’s monster when he realizes that the life he’s been living isn’t what he thought. Then having to connect with his own kind and lead them to freedom. You start to combine physicality with an emotional journey that you’re creating.

On returning to Gollum for “The Hobbit”: Gollum’s never really gone too far away from me because he’s indelibly kind of printed into my DNA now, I think. I’ll tell you what was weird is going back and playing a character that has been so sort of absorbed into public consciousness that you almost don’t feel like you own it anymore. And to sort of gather it back — I mean, I did feel, I think, probably in the first couple of days going back into it that I was sort of doing a weird impersonation of him rather than being him because there have been so many spoofs and people’s impersonations and so on, and some people’s impersonations are really great. And I’m kind  of thinking, “Oh gosh, that’s how to do it, yeah.” And you know, then you get back into it. … Meaningfully getting back into it was really exciting.

Serkis wore a special suit that captured his performance and re-created it in the computer-generated character of Gollum in the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy. (New Line Cinema)

On doing Gollum’s voice: I think my vocal chords are so thrashed that I don’t really feel anything anymore there. During “Lord of the Rings,” I used to have to drink tons of what we call Gollum juice, which was lemon and honey and ginger. And actually when I went back to do “The Hobbit” this time, to reprise the role, I did , probably kind of more romantically and sort of nostalgically, get people to whip up a few bowls of Gollum juice which I used to drink. But it doesn’t really hurt, to be honest, anymore.

On working with Peter Jackson: Peter’s just been the most phenomenal mentor, supporter, friend, collaborator. I cherish working with him so much, and this incredible journey that he’s sort of set me off on, really. Because I’m working on “The Hobbit” not only as Gollum, but I’m directing the second unit. I actually went down there for two weeks to reprise the role of Gollum, and I basically stayed for a year to direct the second unit. So that’s thrilling. I’m really, really enjoying that and getting a chance to work with him from another angle. I’m being his kind of eyes and years for the second unit, really. We’ve just been on location for two months shooting the most beautiful places in New Zealand. That’s been extraordinary. I love working with Pete, and everything that he’s created at WETA. The whole team, the whole outfit in New Zealand in Wellington, is a very, very special, wonderful place that I keep willingly returning to.

Andy Serkis (Al Seib/Los Angeles Times)

On performance-capture technology: Actors often ask that question, “Are we going to be replaced by digital characters?” I think this is all part of the bigger debate about the notion of what performance capture really is all about. For me, I’ve never drawn a distinction between live-action acting and performance-capture acting. It is purely a technology. It’s a bunch of cameras that can record the actor’s performance in a different way. In terms of animation, animators are actors as well. They are fantastic actors. They have to draw from how they feel emotionally about the beat of a scene that they’re working on. They work collaboratively. They all have to understand the psyche of the role that they’re developing. And that will never change. It’s an art form. It’s like saying, “Well, now that photography has arrived, nobody can paint anymore.” Or, “Now that we’re shooting on digital, nobody can use film anymore.” No one’s saying anything is to the exclusivity of anything else. … Without taking away any of the visual effects work that animators and visual effects artists and programmers and technicians in the visual effects world, in my mind, it is a form of digital makeup. … But look, Pixar’s not going to go away. All of those great animation studios, they’re doing fantastic, beautiful work with scripts that are just brought to life in a different way. … [Performance capture is] such a liberating tool. I am quite evangelical about it to other actors because I think it’s such a wonderful — it’s a magic suit you put on that allows you to play anything regardless of your size, your sex, your color, whatever you are. As long as you have the acting chops and the desire to get inside a character, you can play anything. so I long for it to be accepted by the acting profession so that it can proliferate.

– Noelene Clark

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Kate Beckinsale, star of the "Underworld" films. (Gary Friedman/Los Angeles Times)

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Kate Beckinsale stars as Selene in "Underworld: Awakening." (Joe Lederer/Screen Gems/Sony Pictures)

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Kate Beckinsale stars as Selene in "Underworld: Awakening." (Joe Lederer/Screen Gems/Sony Pictures)

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India Eisley plays the hybrid daughter of Selene and Michael Corvin in "Underworld: Awakening." (Joe Lederer/Screen Gems/Sony Pictures)

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Michael Ealy plays Detective Sebastian, a human cop who gets swept into the battle between Lycans and vampires. (Joe Lederer/Screen Gems/Sony Pictures)

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Michael Ealy plays Detective Sebastian, a human cop who gets swept into the battle between Lycans and vampires. (Joe Lederer/Screen Gems/Sony Pictures)

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Theo James, front, plays David, a young vampire who leads a violent resistance in "Underworld: Awakening." (Joe Lederer/Screen Gems/Sony Pictures)

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Kate Beckinsale stars as Selene in "Underworld: Awakening." (Joe Lederer/Screen Gems/Sony Pictures)

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Len Wiseman and Kate Beckinsale arrive at the premiere of "Underworld Awakening" in Los Angeles on Jan. 19, 2012. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles)

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Kate Beckinsale speaks to the Hall H crowd at Comic-Con on July 22, 2011 in San Diego. (Kirk McKoy/Los Angeles Times)

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Kate Beckinsale reprises her role as vampire Selene in the 2006 sequel "Underworld: Evolution." (Doug Curran/Screen Gems)

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Kate Beckinsale reprises her role as vampire Selene in the 2006 sequel "Underworld: Evolution." (Doug Curran/Screen Gems)

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Kate Beckinsale reprises her role as vampire Selene in the 2006 sequel "Underworld: Evolution." (Doug Curran/Screen Gems)

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Kate Beckinsale as Selene in the 2003 film "Underworld." (Egon Endrenyi/Screen Gems)

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Kate Beckinsale as Selene in the 2003 film "Underworld." (Egon Endrenyi/Screen Gems)

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Kate Beckinsale as Selene and Scott Speedman as Michael Corvin in the 2003 film "Underworld." (Egon Endrenyi/Screen Gems)

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Kate Beckinsale as Selene in the 2003 film "Underworld." (Egon Endrenyi/Screen Gems)

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Kate Beckinsale, star of the "Underworld" films. (Gary Friedman/Los Angeles Times)

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Kate Beckinsale, star of the "Underworld" films. (Gary Friedman/Los Angeles Times)

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It’s difficult to reconcile Kate Beckinsale, the slender, silky-voiced actress leaning gracefully on a coral chaise at the Montage Hotel, with Selene, the cold-faced vampire woman who blasts hot metal into the bodies of her werewolf enemies in “Underworld: Awakening.”

In the film, which hit theaters Friday, Selene punches through somebody’s torso. In the Beverly Hills hotel on a recent January evening, Beckinsale absently tucks a soft curl behind her ear as she talks about diving into the vampires-versus-werewolves franchise for the third time. She emanates femininity. That’s how directors saw her a decade ago, when the “Much Ado About Nothing” and “Pearl Harbor” actress was turned down for parts because she appeared too innocent and soft.

“I’d had some feedback from casting directors kind of saying, ‘We don’t know if we really want to see her for this part, ’cause it’s a cop, and she’s really very delicate and British and fragile,’” Beckinsale said. “And I thought, ‘I’ve got to do something about that. I’ve got to play something that has a little bit more edge to it.”

Kate Beckinsale as Selene in the 2003 film "Underworld." (Egon Endrenyi/Screen Gems)

So, for “kind of a personal experiment,” she took a role that had more than a little edge, and a lot of bite. In “Underworld,” Beckinsale played an immortal assassin, or Death Dealer, locked in a generations-old blood feud with the Lycans, or werewolves.

“We kind of updated the vampire thing, which has always historically been rather old and old-fashioned and involving crucifixes and stakes and things, and brought quite a big arsenal of modern weaponry and cool stuff with it,” she said. It’s partly why “Underworld” has endured, she said, even as vampire-werewolf movies proliferate.

Clad in a skintight latex suit and double-fisting Baretta pistols in the franchise’s fourth installment, “Underworld: Awakening,” Beckinsale looks as ageless as she appeared in the first film in 2003. Her youthful visage, which led her to seek the role of Selene, is exactly what allows her, now 38, to convincingly reprise the character seven years later.

“I don’t know how long that’s going to work,” she said with a laugh. “The costume, and the hairstyle, and the amount of working out I have to do all came flooding back very quickly.”

Although the “Underworld” films aren’t beloved by critics, the franchise became a cult favorite, and along with her portrayal of vampire hunter Anna Valerious in “Van Helsing,” the role of Selene furnished Beckinsale with a reputation as one of Hollywood’s few female action heroes focused more on stunts than on sex appeal.

“I do think people like to see it working with a female lead. I think the guys like to see it, but I think the girls like to see it too,” Beckinsale said. “These movies are very entertainment. We’re not madly thinking we’re getting Oscars for them or anything, but there is something extremely gratifying about exactly that. The greatest heroines in these kinds of movies are few and far between, and they are exactly the ones that aren’t sort of winking in a sexy way at the camera.”

Beckinsale’s template for Selene, she said, is Sigourney Weaver’s performance as Ripley in the “Alien” films and Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor in the “Terminator” franchise.

“Beyond that, there’s been a lot of attempts, I think, with a female lead where they kind of blow it by trying to make them too archly sexy or too aware of their sexuality,” she said. “And that’s one of the things I really like about this, is that if you do find her sexy, it’s not essential, and it’s not really on purpose. It’s not something she’s doing.”

That’s not to say her fans don’t find Selene sexy. The vampire character has her own action figure. Young men turned out in droves to see Beckinsale and the filmmakers discuss “Awakening” at Comic-Con in July. And the new movie, despite receiving mediocre reviews, is expected to beat out the competition at the box office this weekend.

Kate Beckinsale, star of the "Underworld" films. (Gary Friedman/Los Angeles Times)

“I think that we were completely accidentally rather ahead of the vampire-werewolf obsession that seems to have swept the world,” Beckinsale said. “There hadn’t really been a kind of really big vampire movie since ‘Blade’ when we did the first one. I remember being pitched ‘Underworld’ by Len, actually, and him saying, ‘You know, there’s been some really cool vampire movies … and there’s been some good werewolf movies, but they’ve never really had them in the same movie fighting against each other.’ And of course, that seems unthinkable that anyone would say that now, ’cause it’s so commonplace, but at the time, it was rather a radical idea.”

“Awakening” shakes up the balance of power between Lycans, vampires and humans. After Selene wakes up in a laboratory, she discovers 12 years have passed, humans are now aware of the Immortals’ existence, they’re trying to eradicate the “virus” that causes vamps and werewolves, and her species is nearing extinction. She also learns she has a daughter — a hybrid child who can rip out a werewolf’s throat with her bare hands — played by India Eisley, the young actress who played Shailene Woodley’s little sister in “The Secret Life of the American Teenager.”

The film brings new directors Måns Mårlind and Björn Stein to the franchise. (Wiseman, who co-wrote and produced “Awakening,” had his hands full directing “Total Recall.”) It also brings a fair amount of computer graphics to the series.

“I had never really come into contact with any CG on an ‘Underworld’ movie, and so that was a little bit like, ‘Oh no! That’s our whole hallmark is that we don’t have CG,’” Beckinsale said. “But unfortunately, one of the characters is this gigantic, massive uber-Lycan, and we couldn’t find anyone willing to wear a suit that big.”

Like the other “Underworld” films, “Awakening” finishes with much left unresolved. Does that mean Beckinsale will don the latex suit for another sequel?

“I love this character,” Beckinsale said. “I really am proud of the fact that I’ve gotten to play this kind of rather iconic empowered, empowering woman. I don’t want to only play one character for the rest of my life, sure, but as long as I feel like I can keep mixing it up, that’s what I’ve wanted to do since the beginning is just keep doing different things. As long as I can do that, I’d be happy to.”

– Noelene Clark

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