Faces to watch

Edgar Ramirez

Actor

In September, 27-year-old Venezuelan-born Ramirez came to Los Angeles to promote his film “Punto y Raya” for this year’s best foreign language film awards derby. He left with a role as part of a trio of, as he describes it, “psychedelic crazy bounty hunters” opposite Mickey Rourke and Keira Knightley in Tony Scott’s “Domino.”

Written by “Donnie Darko” auteur Richard Kelly, the film is based on the life of Domino Harvey, daughter of actor Laurence Harvey, who left a promising modeling career to chase down bail jumpers. For Ramirez, shooting his sixth film overall and first in English, the experience has been an adventure in itself.

As he explains, “I got most of the action scenes in the movie, and I love it. I’ve been jumping from roofs, sitting on the edge of a 30-story building in downtown L.A. I’ve been shooting, kicking people, ripping people’s arms off. And I get to kiss the girl. I can’t complain.”

Cillian Murphy

Actor

First seen by American audiences in the surprise import hit “28 Days Later,” Irish-born actor Murphy has subsequently appeared in “Girl With the Pearl Earring,” “Intermission” and “Cold Mountain.” On a sunny Southern California winter afternoon, he is enjoying a day off from filming the Wes Craven picture “Red Eye.” Before that comes out, however, he will appear this summer as Dr. Jonathan Crane, a.k.a. the Scarecrow, villain of the much-anticipated “Batman Begins.”

Perhaps one of the biggest adjustments to life in the leagues of the comic-book faithful is the veil of secrecy that enshrouds even the smallest of details. More than once in a brief conversation Murphy catches himself midsentence, pausing and redirecting so as not to give anything away.

When he went to a comics convention with the writer, David Goyer, explains Murphy, 32, “I just deferred to him all the time. The script has been on the Internet, and it’s one of those things people have so much investment in and passion about that everything has already been surmised, and it just shouldn’t be in print coming from me. It’ll be worth it. It’s much better waiting for it, isn’t it?”

Kelli Garner

Actress

Garner, 20, plays Howard Hughes’ 15-year-old protege in “The Aviator” and has appeared in darker fare such as “Bully” and “Love Liza.” In “Man of the House,” the Tommy Lee Jones cheerleader comedy, she finally takes on what she calls a “lighter” role. She’ll also be seen in the Sundance entry “Thumbsucker.” As for why the girlish actress has tended to land roles in dark, twisted dramas, she has a theory. “Somebody once told me I have a natural purity and innocence

It was something of a “please help me” moment that landed her a part in “The Aviator.” At her first meeting with director Martin Scorsese and star Leonardo DiCaprio, she was adjusting to new contact lenses. “ I tripped walking in. Of course I didn’t realize it was probably because of all of that they wanted me, this little girl stumbling in on her heels.”