SKYWALKER RANCH, Calif. -- The odds are that no one, not even Star Wars creator George Lucas, got a bigger blast out of making Attack Of The Clones than actor Samuel L. Jackson.
The smooth-talking, jovial Jackson plays Jedi master Mace Windu, an instructor in the high-level Form VII style of lightsabre fighting. Jackson also appeared in Episode I -- The Phantom Menace but he was more diplomatic and interactive with other characters in the movie. He was a wise counsel but not a man of action.
In Attack Of The Clones, he gets to unsheath his lightsabre and show off his prowess, including in a fight with bounty hunter Jango Fett, who is the Mandalorian genetic prototype for the clones who will become the dreaded Stormtroopers for the Imperial Army.
Mace Windu is also one of the Jedi heroes who does battle in the Geonosian gladiatorial arena with fantastic monsters such as the Acklay, the Nexu and the Reek, the latter a rhino-like creature Jackson likens to a mutant SUV.
"It's the biggest kids game in the world," Jackson says with boyish enthusiasm about the assignments he got in this movie. "Just open your mind and have fun."
Holed up for several days of interviews at Lucas' near-legendary Skywalker Ranch, Jackson is giggly happy as he talks about working on Mace during the Australian shoot.
"We were all encouraged to develop our own fighting styles so my Hong Kong film collection came into play quite a bit -- because we've pretty much all decided that Mace is the second baddest guy in the universe." Number one, of course, is Yoda, Jackson says. "Yoda is the man!"
As for the fights, it is obvious that Jackson did not really enter a gladiatorial contest on a distant planet a long time ago with fantastic beasts. Instead, he entered a soundstage at the 20th Century Fox studio in Sydney and swung his lightsabre around while being filmed against blue and green screens, which allow for digital effects to be added later.
No problem, says Jackson. While some actors are intimidated by having to "act" while surrounded by next to nothing, Jackson's imagination is limitless in this arena.
"Totally!" he says of his boyhood emerging in the role. "I spent so much time in my room fighting off imaginary pirates and Basil Rathbone and all those guys, and running from the cyclops and all these other fantastic things.
"So, when George put me in that big empty room and said: 'Okay, lots of things are attacking you, fight 'em off!', I went straight to the place. It was great! I kind of turned my theme music on in my head and started looking around for 'em: Okay, let's go!"
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