Some actors earn love from their public by being accessible and constantly taking roles-- George Clooney has mastered this-- but others become even more beloved by being absent. Daniel Day-Lewis went to go cobble shoes for a few years, then came back with There Will Be Blood and won an Oscar. And while Viggo Mortensen has never completely gone dark, his constant hints at retirement and interest in visual art and music always suggest that we might not have him for long.

A few weeks ago Mortensen suggested strongly that, unless another movie role was really, really appealing, he won't be acting again for a while. Luckily Collider caught up with Mortensen at the Toronto Film Festival to follow up on that, and things aren't quite as bleak as they seemed. He's not retiring! Now, whether or not that means he'll sign back up to be Aragorn in The Hobbit, we don't know.

You can hear his exact words in Collider's video interview, embedded below. Mortensen will be seen next in The Road, a movie that's apparently so harrowing none of us would blame him for taking some time off.