Lucy Liu: Going Ballistic

Lucy Liu is no "Angel," at least not in her new action film Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever. The Charlie's Angels star is a force to be reckoned with as she displays fabulous martial arts skills, wields huge guns and moves like the wind in her cool, black outfits. If you want to really see her go ballistic confuse her with The View star Lisa Ling! When we spoke with her in an L.A. hotel, she was much more sleek and "femme" in a slinky black dress and heels. It's hard to believe that such bombastic action can come in such a petite, demure package.

Lucy dealt with the cold Vancouver weather on the shoot. "It was very exhausting because not only were we kicking butt but the weather was so cold and frigid there. But I had a great time doing it. I had trained so much in Los Angeles that I was really prepared for it. You just can't pick something up and just do it. You have to let it flow or else it won't look natural."

Charlie's Angels and Shanghai Noon were a helpful martial arts launching pad for the actress. Choreography, stick fighting, weight training from seven till six for three and a half months honed Lucy to a fighting edge but, onset, with new partners, it all changed. "The more difficult thing was when you got out there, you're suddenly beating up all these people you don't know. You've been training with a guy and you're used to his rhythms. Then you're fighting with a different guy who's a different size and height and maybe he's got a different energy. Sometimes, when you hit someone, they literally bend with you but these people are just solid. So it's very painful. Then you have to relearn the whole thing. You have to say, 'listen when I punch you in the stomach, can you actually cave in?," she laughs. "Sometimes you do have to say, I'm going to kick you and you have to tighten your stomach so that you can have rebound."

Lucy wasn't badly injured but didn't come away unscathed. "Tons of bruises. I had done a lot of acupuncture and massage before I left to do the movie but when I was in Vancouver I didn't know anybody so I just sort of took a lot of hot baths." There were rumors that co-star Antonio Banderas was badly injured. "He got his face burned. It was pretty intense. I wasn't there but one of the timings was a bit off during the railroad explosion sequence and he was actually right there. They were supposed to be exploding behind him. When he takes his foot off the mine and starts taking off. But you know, it's okay for a guy to get half his face seared off and you go cool, but a woman, no!"

It's been a confusing few months for the actress who has gone from playing Sever to Tarantino's new film Kill Bill where she plays a Japanese underworld Yakuza queen then back to her role as Alex in Charlie's Angels. "It was all about learning Japanese thoroughly, and not speaking with a Chinese American accent. Jumping off of "Sever" and doing Kill Bill and coming back and being Alex in Charlies Angels and doing all Chinese martial arts then. The difference between Chinese and Japanese martial arts is that Japanese people don't bend, you're uptight the whole time. Chinese people are soft, you're moving and more fluid...you're holding your hands and fingers in a different way. So it was relearning and then unlearning again."

It's a balancing act as well dealing with a responsibility for portraying violence in her films. "There is excessive violence in the movie but the irony of it all is that you don't see blood ever. You see a couple of cuts on Antonio's face but that's about it. I don't endorse gun play at all. I think that's what we did in Charlies Angels – we specifically made no gun play for the girls. But this is this kind of movie – it's like asking what do you think about doing an English accent for Shakespeare. I'm not going to deny that this movie is a full action movie- listen, the title is "Ballistic". This isn't a romance and a walk in the park with some ice cream and some laughs. And if you're gonna go ballistic, you're gonna go ballistic. Who hasn't seen explosions to the nth degree in Pearl Harbor or Armageddon?"

Lucy is proud of the real versus CGI action in the film. "These explosions are all real – there's no CGI or computer stuff at all. There was no wire work in the fighting – it's all hand-to-hand combat or guns. It's more a Bullet old-school Steve McQueen action movie. Our budget, first of all, wasn't that big and it's a simple story about 2 people who are trying to find and fulfill something that they needed to do."

We wanted to know what the actress does when she's not kicking butt or ruling the underworld. "I like to do art and I love to go outdoors and do outdoor activities like hiking or horseback riding or rock climbing and things like that. I do photography mixed media. I've had a couple of exhibits and haven't had one in quite a while but I do it on the side and it's just something I really enjoy doing." Lucy is from Jackson Heights, Queens, New York but she was in L. A. when the attack on New York occurred. "I couldn't get in touch with my brother. That was really difficult. He works for the EMT as a volunteer. He went down there and helped. You're always told don't panic; when there's an earthquake don't call everyone you know to see if they're OK. You just don't think it's going to happen to all of us and we realized that we're so vulnerable. And it's a very scary feeling. It's an empowering feeling too because it makes you unite and it makes you realize that you can make a difference. It makes you prioritize a lot of things."

Lucy's trip to ground zero had a profound impact. "I took photographs. I was there last October. There was ash snow everywhere and it smelled horrifying. There were tour buses and crowds of people coming to give support, prayer and meditation – give flowers, write banners...basically to come and memorialize. Obviously some were there to mourn but also to celebrate that so many people had gotten out. Everyone looked so exhausted. They actually let me onto the site and it was just chilling. I wasn't going to sit there and be emotional about it – here's all these guys that had been working so hard so I just tried to give moral support. I took photographs, sent them pictures – I mean what do you do to comfort when there's been such devastation?"

The "Sever" character is a mom who has lost her family. Her boss is responsible. Lucy isn't married but could relate. "The imagination is not difficult to access. I think if you love somebody and you've lost them, she wanted revenge. She needed to find peace for herself. And apparently, the way she was trained, basically to kill, she wasn't going to go off and go to a kibbutz and just decide that she'd be OK with everything in 10 years. She wanted this guy and that's all she wanted."

Lucy's character was originally supposed to be a man. The script was once considered by Swarzenegger and Stallone. She was happy with the change. "She was originally supposed to be a male character. You can have a man against a woman and they can have a fight scene and she's not going to be whining and pulling hair – for this movie, it wasn't about gender and emotion – it was about skills. I think it's nice to see a woman who has skills and not try to make it seem like she's weaker. The fight with Ray Park, she's not going to overpower him, the man is twice her size. But she's going to use what she has. You don't want her to seem like a machine. She's not the Terminator. She's a woman, she's going to get caught, she's going to bleed. I was really glad that they went with that."

Lucy's co-star Ray (Darth Maul) Park, loved martial arts from childhood. She admits to seeing Hong Kong films as well. "Well, you used to watch whatever your parents were watching. My father would watch martial arts films but it seemed very normal to watch martial arts films when you're Chinese. You go to Chinatown and watch whatever is in the movie theater." Lucy loved all the Once Upon A Time in China films and Jackie Chan. "I watched all of his movies because they're so comedic and funny, yet skilled. I didn't know half the people's names but I do now because they're so popular in America now."

The beautiful Asian-American actress wasn't that thrilled with the Chinese stereotypes she was faced with as a child. "You go to an American school and have people say 'Oh, can you do Kung Fu?' And it's like No. It's normal to watch martial arts movies for me and it's also normal for me to eat rice a lot but that's just my choice and that's the way I was brought up. Not every Asian person would do that. But one of the reasons I decided to pick it up was I was so sick and tired of people saying 'do You know Kung Fu'? And then I could say 'Yes, I do'."

Lucy's character is quite scary and dangerous in the film. We asked what really scared her and got a very thoughtful answer. "A lot of things care me. I think ignorance scares me the most."

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Lynn Barker is a Hollywood-based entertainment journalist and produced screenwriter.