Clive Owen at the Toronto International Film Festival. (Dave Abel, Sun Media)

Clive Owen is man enough to cry, on cue. You got a problem with that?

"If you look, I've cried a few times in my movies," says the star of action-oriented fare such as Inside Man and Shoot 'Em Up, and a one-time short-list candidate for the role of James Bond.

"I've never been afraid of it at all. I cried in Children Of Men, for example."

And shot quite a few people, but never mind.

The much more lachrimose The Boys Are Back is based on the novel by journalist Simon Carr about the experience of piecing together a household with his two boys after the cancer death of his wife.

It's sad, it's comic, and it explores different levels of relationships, both childhood and adult.

"I read the script and I was taken by it," Owen says.

"I'm a parent, I go off to work and when I come back, the rest of my life is taken by my girls at home (ages 10 and 12). I thought I'd really like to explore that part of me in my work, and I was very excited by it. Working with kids, I thought this could be really exciting."

Australian director Scott Hicks -- who knows a thing or two about feelings, with films such as Shine and Snow Falling On Cedars on his c.v. -- said hiring a screen tough guy was deliberate.

"It was that very quality that made it really interesting, to take that tough image and crack it open and say, 'Let's see him play a flawed and vulnerable man who's struggling emotionally and trying to do the best he can in putting bits and pieces of his family together all over again.'

"It's too easy to cast Clive Owen as the tough, shoot-'em-up guy. Nothing wrong with that, but isn't it lovely when the actor himself can show another dimension?

"And Clive was absolutely up for that."

In the movie, real-life political columnist Simon becomes a sportswriter named Joe.

And his new family consists of Artie (Nicholas McAnulty), the son he lives with but doesn't really know, and Harry (George MacKay), the teenage son from a previous marriage he hasn't seen in years. Owen expressed his commitment by showing up early to get to know seven-year-old McAnulty.

"I got to Australia early and made sure I spent some proper time with him without his mother being there, without the film people being there. We went for days in the park and just hung out. I needed him to feel safe with me. You'll smell it if he's not. It would be obvious we weren't father and son."

Carr's fallback fathering in the book was what he called "free-range parenting," a slovenly, almost rule-less existence that Owen says is an exaggerated take on what normally happens when fathers become caregivers.

"I think guys generally ... well, a day with dad is different from a day with mom, always. It's always a bit loose with dad. I don't know if it has something to do with that maternal instinct, the protective thing women have for children. I just think guys do it differently, and in this case, y'know it's so extreme, it inevitably comes crashing down."

Not to worry, if you're a fan of the tough-guy Owen.

Though the final pieces are not in place, pending a finished script, the actor is set to take part in Inside Man 2, which would reunite him with director Spike Lee and Denzel Washington, in a continuation of the tale of a bank robber (Owen) robbing what turns out to be a Nazi-financed bank, and a grudgingly respectful relationship that develops between him and the cop in charge (Washington).

"There's another sort of scam, and some new people get involved," he says. "If they get a script that everybody likes, we're good to go."

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