Jude Law: I joined the Navy

Jude Law joined the Royal Navy for a few days.

The British star is showing his action-man qualities in new movie Black Sea, where he plays a submarine captain searching for an underwater vessel rumoured to be loaded with gold.

To make sure his performance was authentic, Jude spent some time with the British navy - although he got more out of it than just job satisfaction.

"I was very lucky to be invited by the Royal Navy to go off on a submarine mission, so I went off for a couple of days with them. To be honest, more for a life experience than any sort of research," Jude told esquire.co.uk.

"We shot the film on an actual submarine that some wonderful, crazy guy had bought and had sitting in an estuary in Rochester [English town]. Being there, rather than on a set, heightened the drama for us. You’re on top of each other and it gets very claustrophobic."

While Jude has been nominated for two Oscars throughout his career - one for Cold Mountain and the other for The Talented Mr. Ripley - he isn't a star who floods the movie market with film after film.

He currently has three new projects in the pipeline, with a third instalment of Sherlock Holmes also recently announced. When looking for his next job, the 41-year-old likes to be tested.

"As long as there’s some kind of challenge, and as long as the director is not going to let you down, I’m open to anything. That’s literally all I think about: who’s directing it, is there something in there to mine, is it going to be an interesting journey, you know?" he explained.