Callum Keith Rennie's character in a new movie, Last Night, is sex obsessed -- in the sweetest way possible. "He's not bad, he's not evil," the actor says.

Rennie, the epitome of ragged cool in a country that is wary of charisma, plays a carnal yet naive man who is toting up his conquests by category. So he joyfully beds his high school French teacher (Genevieve Bujold) and awkwardly propositions his best buddy (Don McKellar).

He doesn't have much time. Last Night, written and directed by McKellar and opening here tomorrow, is the darkly comic story of what happens to a group of Torontonians in the last six hours of life on Planet Earth. Other key performers include Sandra Oh, David Cronenberg and Sarah Polley.

Before filming, Rennie was worried that his character might turn into a pyscho or just a jerk. "Don and I had a lot of discussions about that because, on the page, he looked like he might be a sociopath rather than just a sweet guy who's just trying to get some things out of the way, some experiences that he really wants to touch upon before he departs. "On the page, it looked quite daunting. Are these acts of love or acts of loathing or acts of expression? The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom."

Talking with Rennie is an intriguing experience. He thinks. He reacts. He teases. He provokes. He pushes boundaries. Rennie is a reformed alcoholic and drug dabbler who has been clean-and-sober for five years and now casually refers to his years of booze-soaked despair as "the addiction."

REJECTS THE 'STAR' LABEL

He came to acting and public notoriety late. Now 38, Rennie was 33 when he finally took acting seriously as a craft and as a career. In films, he was discovered as Sandra Oh's boyfriend in Mina Shum's Double Happiness, going on to roles in John L'Ecuyer's Curtis's Charm and Bruce McDonald's hugely underrated Hard Core Logo. On TV, he played Paul Gross' 'American' counterpart in the last year of Due South.

Just don't call him "a star," even though, with his smoldering eyes and natural charm, he is star material. "I don't think they really understand what they're talking about," he says wearily of journalists who have dubbed him as Canada's "hottest" actor. "I can't get asses in the seats for movies. There has been more coverage of me for a television show (Due South) than for any movie I've done."

That might change with Last Night or Cronenberg's futuristic thriller eXistenZ -- Rennie is part of an international ensemble -- but he is not cocky. "I've learned not to invest over the years because of how films like Hard Core Logo and some other ones have just not done well.

"They can get all the publicity and advertising and the greatest hype -- and all for the right reasons -- and a Canadian audience will still not respond to it because it doesn't have a 'star' name. If we had put Keanu Reeves in Hard Core, there would have been a greater audience for it. It's the marquee name and that's the nature of the business, which we have yet to understand in Canada."

Born in Sunderland, England, raised in Edmonton from the age of four and trained in acting between bouts of alcoholic depression across English Canada from Vancouver to Toronto, Rennie is now based in both Toronto and L.A.., where he has had a sublet since September. He is growing impatient with Canadian sensibilities, especially in film.

"It's hard. And it always sounds like a bitch and that you're biting the hand that feeds you. But you feel confused here. You just don't know what's around the corner, what's next. If you stay here long enough, you're the lobster climbing out of the pot and everybody's going to hate your guts."