If you're not distracted by the bared flesh of Gwyneth Paltrow or the chiselled cheekbones of Viggo Mortensen, you might notice the art in A Perfect Murder. The energetic, large-scale canvases in the loft of Mortensen's character - Paltrow's sinister artist lover - really are the work of the 39-year-old actor, who also takes photographs, and has published a book of his poetry. How does he find the time? 'I don't have a TV,' says Mortensen, the New York raised son of a Danish businessman and an American homemaker.

The actor, who ordered moviegoers to attention last year as G.I. Jane's sadistic master chief, is just as versatile onscreen. Divorced from Exene Cervenka of the "80s punk band X (they have a 10-year-old son, Henry), Mortensen specializes in chilly villains (except in an upcoming remake of Psycho, where he will play the boyfriend of Anne Heche's doomed damsel). 'When I started out I couldn't try out for anyone even remotely shady because I looked sort of boyish,' he says, 'But once I did [a villain] reasonably well...good luck getting the part of the nice small-town druggist.'