A CHANGE OF HOBBIT ELIJAH WOOD COMES OUT SWINGING IN FIRST THREE MOVIES OF HIS POST-'RINGS' CAREER.

Byline: Bob Strauss Film Writer

There is life after ``Lord of the Rings.''

Elijah Wood, who played lead Hobbit Frodo Baggins in the epic film trilogy, is back in three couldn't-be-more-different movies this year. Off screen, the former child star is more involved in music than ever and trying to come to grips with the destruction of one of his favorite places on Earth.

Still, you can take the little fellow out of Middle-earth, but you can't get his association with J.R.R. Tolkien's fantasy world out of most people's minds.

``It would be sort of wrong to get upset about it,'' Wood, 24, says without a hint of resentment. ``It was the greatest experience of my life, both personally and professionally. And, you know, the movies were massive. If people weren't asking about 'Lord of the Rings' still, that would be a little weird.''

At the moment, Wood is more interested in talking about a truly unusual phenomenon. Two independent movies he made in Europe - the English soccer-hoodlum drama ``Green Street Hooligans'' and the adaptation of Jonathan Safran Foer's eccentric, best-selling novel ``Everything Is Illuminated,'' about a young American's search for his lost Ukrainian heritage - open in L.A. this month.

And they could not be more different. ``Green Street'' is packed with kinetic anger, as American visitor Matt Buckner gets caught up in the adrenalin rush of a soccer ``firm,'' or street-fighting fan club. The semi-autobiographical Foer Wood plays is a studious introvert who spends most of the movie in the backseat of an old jalopy as two Ukrainian guides drive him around the countryside in search of a shtetl that was wiped out during the Holocaust.

It was a culture shock Wood says he had no trouble navigating.

``There was a month's buffer between the two, which was definitely helpful, and I think I may have done the two days on 'Sin City' in that time, too,'' the actor says (he played a mute, cannibalistic assassin in the comic book noir that came out earlier this year). ``But there's something about an environment that informs the way you would acclimate to a character.

``In London with those guys, going to the football matches and going to the pub beforehand created the atmosphere for which that movie was made. Then, going to Eastern Europe, suddenly I was in a completely different environment. It was quieter and more intimate. That kind of wipes the slate clean. Had it only been a week in between, though, that might have been relatively difficult.''

Liev Schreiber, the respected stage and screen actor who makes his feature-directing debut with ``Illuminated,'' explains why he felt that the gentle sensitivity Wood exudes was vital for his film.

``I had been working in Europe as an actor, and I'd heard a lot of disparaging things about Americans,'' recalls Schreiber, who filmed most of his movie in the Czech Republic.

``There was this sort of cliched notion about who Americans were that I understood but felt very frustrated by. So I felt it was important that we presented a character who defied those stereotypes and that presented us in all of our neuroses, vulnerability, eccentricity, openness and innocence - most importantly, that he was looking for his own heritage beyond the borders of his country.

``Elijah Wood fits that mold, to me. There's something insanely sweet about him. And he is a very, very good-natured and kind person. There were homeless guys I hired to be in the movie because I liked their look, and they complained about the conditions sooner than Elijah did!''

Perhaps Wood was too busy trying to make the bottled-up Foer role watchable.

``A lot of the challenge was to keep the character interesting and maintaining that quiet atmosphere without it getting boring,'' Wood says. ``It was a lot of fun as well because it's all about reactions, both physically and facially.''

So how does such a nice young man, whose big-eyed compassion has been evident since his child-star days in the likes of ``Avalon,'' ``The War'' and ``The Good Son,'' morph into a thrill-seeking street fighter?

``I didn't know much about hooligan culture,'' says Wood, who trained for three weeks to become ``Green Street's'' convincing brawler. ``I had heard about football violence, but I didn't realize how intense it really is, how organized it is and how, more importantly, these people aren't necessarily criminals in their daily life.

``They almost have this double life. They have families, some of them have relatively good jobs. That fascinated me, and also to take a character from that relatively innocent place to make him a hooligan. It was very attractive to me to explore a darker side of humanity that I'd not explored in film before.''

Although the slightly built, naturally frail-looking Wood confidently says that he could now handle himself in a fight, he conceded that ``Green Street'' director Lexi Alexander, a karate and kickboxing champion who ran with a soccer firm in her native Germany, ``could surely kick my ass. But she's not an intimidating person at all.''

Will many admirers of the cuddly Wood accept this rougher, tougher incarnation?

``If actors made decisions based on their fan base solely, then that could be problematic and not very freeing,'' he says. ``No, I was never, ever concerned about how the fans would react in a negative way. It's always been important to me to change perception and be a part of roles and films that are different from the last I've worked on.''

And to pursue different interests as well. Rabid music enthusiast Wood is in the final stages of launching his own boutique record label. And he occasionally DJs at The Bar in Hollywood.

``A little bit, just for fun,'' the modest Iowan says with a shrug. ``A friend owns the place, and every once in awhile, I play music for people. And the idea for starting a label came up a few years back, and it's just now coming to fruition, which is exciting. It's nice to put energy into something else that I'm also passionate about.''

There's a passion to party as well, demonstrated when Wood served as wine god Bacchus on a Mardi Gras parade float in 2004. He was back for more during this year's Bourbon Street celebration. But who knows when, or if, there will be another one.

``It's horrifying, horrifying,'' he says of the New Orleans hurricane catastrophe. ``All of my friends there are out of the city and fine. But it's such a historic and amazing place, with so much life and character and so much culture. Just to think of all those people who don't have homes anymore; it's awful.''

Although there is certainly less urgency to it, keeping in touch with ``Lord of the Rings'' co-stars is an important part of Wood's life, too.

`We do keep relative tabs on each other,'' he says. ``All of us stay in communication and are extremely proud of each other's work. It's like a massive support group. I saw Dom (``Lost's'' Dominic Monaghan, who also played a Hobbit) about a month ago. It's like whenever anyone's in town or we're in the same place, we'll try and see each other.''

That's just one of the reasons why Wood doesn't mind addressing those endless ``LOTR'' questions at all.

``It changed my life in a lot of ways, as a human being first and foremost,'' he says of the effort. For me, working on these movies replaced my university in a lot of ways. I was 18, went and lived in New Zealand for over a year, did a lot of growing, made some of the best friends in my life. And it's also created opportunities as an actor that I wouldn't otherwise have.''

Bob Strauss, [phone]

bob.strauss(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

2 photos

Photo:

(1) Elijah Wood is an American student who, upon visiting England, gets caught up in soccer-fueled street fighting between rival ``firms'' in ``Green Street Hooligans.''

(2) ``Everything Is Illuminated'' features Elijah Wood as a young American man searching for his heritage among the Holocaust-era ruins of in the Ukraine.