The last time Liv Tyler graced the big screen, she was the object of the Incredible Hulk's affections.
Three years later, she's pursued by another superhero in the very dark comedy "Super," opening Friday.
There's a difference. This hero wears a poorly stitched red costume and bashes criminals — and people who cut in line — with a wrench.
A lot has happened off-screen in those three years. After what she described as a painful divorce from rocker Royston Langdon, Tyler left New York for Los Angeles — to have a yard for her son, Milo, and take a break from acting, with its three-month tours of duty away from home.
"I worked quite intensely on 'The [Incredible] Hulk' and ‘The Strangers' and then I definitely was going through some stuff and took time off to be with my son," says Tyler.
But the native New Yorker — she was born in Mount Sinai Hospital — couldn't stay away from acting or her favorite city.
"I'm so happy to be home," she says. "I just missed the everyday interaction with human beings, that feeling of walking down the street and looking someone in the eye and seeing crazy, beautiful, weird things happen and knowing the guy who works in the deli.
"I really thrive energetically off of human contact and observing, and that energy and that pace. I love seasons so much and I missed that — and then I found myself in January in the biggest snowstorm," she says, laughing.
Recharged, Tyler also looked for the right vehicle to make her return to movies. She found it when writer-director James Gunn ("Slither") approached her to play Sarah, a heroin-addled waitress who falls into the clutches of a major drug dealer (Kevin Bacon), pushing her husband (Rainn Wilson) into becoming a costumed vigilante to win her back.
Armed with his wrench and a bloodthirsty sidekick (Ellen Page), however, the Crimson Bolt gets to like hurting evildoers a little too much.
"There was something so touching and heartfelt about this story to me that I could even relate to with friends in my life or myself," says Tyler. "That feeling of loving somebody so much that you would just do anything to have them back, you know?"
The marathon shoot, crammed into 24 days, was emotionally exhausting. On the first day of filming, Gunn knocked out the film's opening montage, leaving time for just one or two takes per scene.
Tyler says she went home afterward and cried in frustration, but came back on day two and quickly fell into stride.
"I've been doing this since I was 13," she says. "I feel so passionate about what I do, but I didn't want to be in a rush to do things just to do them. I'm just trying to follow my heart."
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