Bruce Willis is angry. He's angry at the world.

Well, maybe that's taking it a bit far but he had some pretty strong feelings about the war, government, republicans, Entertainment Weekly, and James Frey as he talked to reporters a few weeks ago. Bruce was in New York City to promote his new cop action/drama, "16 Blocks," in which he co-stars with Mos Def and David Morse. The Richard Donner-directed drama tells of a NYC cop on the verge of becoming washed up when he is assigned the task of transporting a prisoner to court, where the prisoner is to stand trial before a jury and give testimony that points to corruption in the NYPD. He only has 16 blocks to go from the station to the courthouse, yet he soon finds that it may take longer than he expected.

Below is a rather entertaining and interesting transcript from the press conference, where he talks about, well, everything.

Q: You're no stranger to the cop role. Is there something about them that you find fascinating or inspiring?

BRUCE: Well, I think it's because partly because I'm from South Jersey and I have a strong affinity towards working class people. I believe that any job that requires you to possibly get shot at or get shot dead, you should be paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for [it]. These guys don't get paid anything. Yet they go out there and do it and there's not a lot of them out there, and they are the last line between us and the wolves and the chaos that's out in the world. There's a lot of chaos in the world. All these cops, EMT workers, men and women, emergency room doctors and nurses and people that every night have to see horrific things. There should be thousands of films done about these guys. And they should get paid more money. A lot more money.

Q: You played your character in "16 Blocks" in a more low-key manner as opposed to the macho role we used to know you for. Is this not Bruce Willis the action star?

BRUCE: I never considered any of those things. They're all elements in the script. It never said that I had to be overweight, but I've known guys who are capable of drinking a bottle and a half of Scotch a night and they're a little overweight. I think they call it booze weight. So I thought it would help. But everything else, the limp and the attitude and how beat up he is, were all written by Richard Wenk, the screenwriter. But that said, it could have just been another stupid run-down-the-street or limp-down-the street Bruce Willis film.

This film didn't really come together till Mos Def showed up with the character. No one knew what he was going to do. All we knew was that we were fortunate enough to get him. And he showed up with a character that was just genius. That's not him. He doesn't talk like that. He doesn't act like that. He's a very smart creative young man. And it changed the fabric of the film. And it changed the way we all looked at the film. There is sort of a spontaneous chemistry happening in this film that I'm not sure would have happened had it been another actor. I was asked yesterday: how do you feel working with a rapper turned actor? I don't think about him in that way at all. I think that he is an actor, and if he wants to do poetry, then he can do that. If he wants to rap, then he can do that. But he is an actor and he's a very creative guy. And everybody benefited from his performance in this film, especially me and especially my character.

Q: We understand that it was you who got Mos Def to join the picture?

BRUCE: We were friends. I've known him for a while and I first saw him in "Monster's Ball." I called him up and he was in Florida getting ready to do an album and I said, "You should take a look at this, it's a terrific, really good part." And I think this is a career-making role for him. I think people are going to see him in a much different way. I love him and he's just like a little angel and in real life too. But in this movie he really has an angelic quality, which just comes out of him. He's not acting that; it's just Mos.

Q: Did you have any fears about doing a movie centered around police corruption?

BRUCE: The thing that I like about this film that comes out of, I'm not sure it would have happened had Mos not done the film, but the story in the film is kind of a microcosmic view of what's going on in the world, the chaos in the world. I personally feel that the world is out of control and we can't effect the politicians, we can't get the lobbyists out of Washington, we can't connect with our senators and congressmen who don't give shit about us. They're just up there. It just seems that their job is to do nothing, is to give the appearance of them doing something but they're not doing anything. And money corrupts. It's all about money and everybody needs money. If cops were paid $150,000 a year, instead of 40, to get shot at every night, and have 5 kids that you've got to put through school, not going to happen. And as a man, in this modern world, we're still the hunted gatherers, we have to protect our family and we protect the cave, you want a house where your kids are safe and you're going to do whatever that takes. Sometimes, it takes breaking the law and becoming corrupt. Money does corrupt.

Q: Your character undergoes a life-changing turn and so is there anything like that, that's happened to you personally?

BRUCE: Having three kids changed me. I think the kind of change we show in this film is the most difficult kind. If your doctor says, "Hey, you'll die if you smoke another packet of cigarettes," you'll give up but most of the time it comes down to those kinds of life threatening situations to get people to change. The kind of change you see in this film, comes because my character wakes up; and he doesn't do it by it himself. It's one of the things I love most about this film, is that my character couldn't have changed had it not been for Mos Def's character and vice versa so what does that say? Do we need each other? We need each other's help to change sometimes. Change is a difficult thing

Q: Richard Donner says that it's the right time for you to play this character. Do you agree?

BRUCE: I don't think I could've played Jack Mosely 10 years ago. I knew when I was in my 30s that by the time I got into my 40s and late 40s that I would grow into, that I would know so much more about life and have lived more life. It just allowed me to give this character a different worldview than I had when I was in my 30s. And there are just such better parts now. There's just so much cooler things to be able to do.

You've all seen it, you've all read it, you've all seen the little things trying to make you feel less of a man because you're losing your hair, but they can all suck my [mouths the word "cock"] You know what I mean?

I'm a man and I will kick anybody's ass who tries to tell me that I'm not a man because my hair's thinning.

Q: You've jumped from Hollywood blockbuster to indie to blockbuster. Is there a greater chasm between what a film critic wants to see and what the audiences want to see?

BRUCE: Hollywood's changed a great deal since 9/11. It's a much more cautious time in Hollywood now and it'll come back. It'll change. When five movies come out and make- - five different films of different genres come out and make $150 million each or $200 million each, it'll go back. They'll start spending money again. But it really is a cautious period of austerity in Hollywood. The Oscars, I don't know. I don't have any comment about the Oscars because the Oscars are people's opinions and I don't think it reflects public opinion all the time. Sometimes it does. I will say that.

Q: Entertainment Weekly says that they would like to not see a "Die Hard 4"...

BRUCE: Entertainment Weekly hates me. They've hated me since they've been a magazine. Fuck ‘em. And you can go and tell them that.

Q: Why?

BRUCE: Because I'm a threat to them. Why does anybody hate anybody? Because they have some beef. Who cares? They can all blow me.

All those magazines, here's a good example: Look at what happened to James Frey in the last two weeks. That's a great book, a great book and so is the follow up book. Just because his publisher chose to say these are memoirs, it took it out of being a work of fiction, a great work of fiction, very well written, to this guy being sucker punched on Oprah. By one of the most powerful women in television just to grind her own axe about it.

Hey Oprah, you had President Clinton on your show. And if this prick didn't lie about a couple things, I'm going to set myself on fire right now.

James Frey is a writer. He can write whatever he wants. It's fiction. It's just shameful how he was treated. It's just shameful and it's just not fair and not right. Justin Timberlake had a really good response when he was asked about that because I think he was asked to play James Frey in the making of that book. And he waited and waited and listened to everybody and said, “Have you heard of this magazine called In Touch Magazine? Or Us Weekly? Or People Magazine? Or any of these magazines?" They lie about people and they just make up shit all week long. And you have to sue ‘em to get it changed. This is the world we live in. That is approved and that is okay and people go, “Ooh, ooh. Somebody's boning this person over here or something, somebody did this over there and they're all lies and nobody's yelling at them." So let's leave James Frey alone, how about it? I'm pissed off today.

Q: You're one of the few actors who have been vocal about being Republican...

BRUCE: Let me stop you right there. Everybody write this down because I'm sick of answering this fucking question. (Laughter) I'm a Republican only as far as I want a smaller government, I want less government intrusion, I want them to stop pissing on my money and your money, the tax dollars that we give 50 per cent of or 40 per cent of every year, and I want them to be fiscally responsible, and I want these goddam lobbyists out of Washington. Do that and I'll say I'm a Republican. But other than that, I want the government to take care of people who need help, like the kids in foster care, the half a million kids who are in orphanages right now, they call them foster homes but they're orphanages. I want them to take care of the elderly and give them free medicine, give them whatever they need. There's tons, billions and billions of dollars that are just being wasted. Okay? I hate government. I'm apolitical. Write that down. I'm not a Republican.

Q: Do you think violence is necessary to do the right thing?

BRUCE: Occasionally. Occasionally, when push comes to shove. I'm not a violent man or advocate violence. I will say this. The example that comes to mind I think what the United States and everyone who cares about protecting the freedoms that the largest part of the free world now has should do whatever it takes to end terrorism in the world. And not just in the Middle East.

I'm talking also about going to Colombia and doing whatever it takes to end the cocaine trade. It's killing this country. It's killing all the countries that coke goes into. I believe that somebody's making money on it in the United States. If they weren't making money on it, they would have stopped it. They could stop it in one day. They could stop it in one day. It's just a plant that they grow, and these guys are growing it likes it's corn or tobacco or any other thing. By the time it gets here it becomes a billion-dollar industry. And I think that's a form of terrorism as well. I don't know what this has to do with "16 Blocks." (Laughter) But I'm in the mood. Did I answer your question?

Violence? Look, we live in a violent world, man. This country was founded on violence. Who's kidding who? We came here and said to the Native American Indians "O.K., we got some bad news, we got some pretty bad news, and we got some really bad news. The bad news is we're here. The pretty bad news is we're not leaving. The really bad news is we're going to take all your land, every tiny little bit of land that you guys have and put you on this little postage stamp of desert where you can't grow a thing, unless of course we find oil on that land. Then we'll move you to another little postage-stamp place in Arizona, and we're going to fuck you over and give you blankets filled with smallpox," and if that's not violence, then what is my man? What is? So I'm apolitical! Could I be any clearer?

Q: Do your strong feelings help fuel your characters in the movies, like the look in your eyes in "16 Blocks"?

BRUCE: I don't like the world. I don't think it's being run correctly and I think it could be done a lot better and because I'm old enough to have grown up at a time when Jack Kennedy got shot. I remember when the news was just 'here's what happened and we're going to show you what it is. Now the news is manipulated and managed and it's all meant to scare you. They don't show you anything good. They don't show you anything good coming out of Iraq, all they say this many dead since Bush took office. Things ARE happening today, I went over and saw things for myself and there's a lot of jacked up things. So that's where that look comes from. I don't have to look too far to find it, all you got to do is think about the world my daughters will inherit and I get that look in my eyes.

"16 Blocks" opens in theaters this Friday.