In his latest film, "Unleashed," which opens nationwide Friday, Li said he hopes to put the spectacular, stylized violence of recent martial arts-influenced films into the proper context of Asian belief.

"If people only know martial arts and just use it to hurt people, they are like dogs," Li said in a phone interview from China. "You need to (have) a more important understanding of life, family, responsibility and compassion. You have to know how to control martial arts."

In "Unleashed" (originally titled "Danny the Dog"), Li plays a man who has been held captive since childhood by an English gangster and trained to be an attack dog. Brutalized his whole life, Li's character "Danny" finds his redemption through his love of music and through the compassion of a blind American piano tuner (Morgan Freeman) and his daughter (Kerry Condon).

Li approached writer-producer Luc Bresson, with whom he had worked on the ill-fated "Kiss of the Dragon" four years ago, with the idea of doing an action film that examined the dark side of violence.

"I told him I wanted to make a movie with a character I had never played before, a movie that would show that violence isn't the only solution," Li said. "You need a balance.

"I wanted to do something new so I can try to show the Asian philosophy — that violence can be good but it's not the only solution," he said.

To the Dogs

To prepare for the role, Li literally went to the dogs.

"I went to the dog pound to watch how the dogs behave," Li says. "It was there that I discovered my character."

Li said the process of bringing Danny to life was "very painful."

After shooting wrapped up each day, he would often return alone to the dog pound to keep his focus and maintain his sense of what his character's inner life should feel like."

"Unleashed" reunited Li with renowned fight choreographer Yuen Wo Ping ("Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon"), who worked with Li to develop a distinct, animalistic fighting style to reflect the brutality and lack of compassion that had shaped his character. That style is in full, brutal view in the first few fight sequences as Danny, released from the metal collar used to control him, viciously attacks opponents one at a time, "like an animal."

"With Wo Ping, I created all new movements for the character," Li says. "As he starts to control himself, he gets more control of his body."

Action aside, the role of Danny required that Li extend himself as a dramatic actor. To do that, Li said he spent two months working intensively with an acting coach and, once filming began, paying close attention to the talent that surrounded him in Freeman and Bob Hoskins ("The Long Good Friday").

"Morgan is a very great man," Li said. "Like your best friend or your father, you always feel safe around him. He's very professional, and he works hard."

Li said Freeman would arrive on set already ready to go, his eyes already shielded to simulate blindness.

"He would walk in asking, 'Where is Jet? Where is this?'" Li said. "He was already in character."

Intense upbringing

Li is no stranger to rigorous training and preparation. At age 8 he received training at the Beijing Sports and Exercise School, a government-sponsored training facility where he first learned the Chinese martial art wushu. Within a year, he won the first of several national wushu competitions.

As his natural abilities became more apparent, Li was removed from his regular school and sent to live at the training facility's dormitory.

He and the other conscripted trainees endured intensive day and night training Li recalls as "exceptionally harsh."

So harsh were the penalties for showing weakness that Li once practiced for two days with a broken foot.

Jet Li, plays a dangerous and brutalized fighter in "Unleashed," about the true nature of violence.

'UNLEASHED' — Opens Friday — Rated: R — 103 minutes

In a memoir posted on his official Web site, Li recalls setting off a minor international incident at Honolulu International Airport when he reacted enthusiastically to a China Airlines plane, unaware that the airline was owned and operated by a Taiwanese company.

Li was also the center of attention during an appearance at the White House on the same tour. After watching Li perform, then-President Richard Nixon asked the boy if he would like to be his bodyguard. Li, dutifully prepped, responded that he would not defend any single person, only his one billion Chinese countrymen.

After a prolonged, shocked silence, Secretary of State Henry Kissinger quipped: "Heavens, such a young boy and he already speaks like a diplomat."

Li said those early encounters with the West helped to shape his inclusive world view, a desire for unity that has only been enhanced by his study of Tibetan Buddhism.

Buddhist beliefs

"With the technology we have today, the world is like a big family," Li said. "I want to show my responsibility to the whole world. You see this in the film with Morgan as a black father, (Condon) as his white daughter and me as an Asian son. As a Buddhist, I believe the earth is connected."

Li said he has also spent much time recently thinking about the inherent impermanence of life, a fundamental Buddhist awareness that was made manifest by the tsunami disaster that devastated Asia earlier this year.

The actor and his family arrived in the Maldives a day before the tsunamis hit.

Liu Jiuan (Jet Li) carries a shaken Jessica (Bridget Fonda) to safety in "Kiss of the Dragon." Advertiser library photo • 2001

Li scooped up his younger daughter and rushed back to the hotel.

"I was fighting the water the whole way," he said. "Within a few minutes the whole island was under water."

Li's family escaped unharmed, but Li sustained an injury to his foot kicking away furniture that was floating through his hotel lobby.

"The experience made me believe in Buddhism even more," Li said. "No matter how powerful you might be, you can always be overpowered. You can lose your life.

"I came away thinking you need to do more for your family and for the world. It is very important to share ideas with the world. It's important to take care of life, and your friends, and your city."

Li readily acknowledges the impermanence of his own career as an action-film actor. For all of the box-office success he has enjoyed in recent years and for all of the strides he has made as a dramatic actor, he knows that his opportunities will taper when he is no longer able to perform martial arts at a high level.

"One day I cannot fight anymore ... so?" he said. "You never know if one or two films later people are not that interested. I respect that.

"When I am done acting, I will do something else. I want to work more with charities to help poor people."

Yet, at age 42, Li said he still has something to contribute to film.

He is currently working on a remake of the Bruce Lee classic "Fearless," a film that he says is consistent with his evolving message.

"It's about a real character, but it shows my philosophy of how to use martial arts," Li says. "What is martial arts? In Chinese it means, 'stop war.' "