Los Angeles ? The big guy from Austria likes the sound of California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Pumping political iron will have to wait awhile, though, while the actor revisits roles as the world’s favorite cyborg from the future and a family man-superspy.

A Republican booster and organizer for inner-city youth programs, Schwarzenegger said he considered running for governor this year but put his political career on hold to shoot “Terminator 3: The Rise of the Machines.” He hopes to follow that up with a “True Lies” sequel.

Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican booster and organizer of inner-city youth programs, says he considered running for governor in California this year but put his political career on hold to shoot Terminator

“For the next few years, I will be busy with show business and movies, and then I can rethink the whole thing later on,” Schwarzenegger said in an interview. “I don’t like what I see in the leadership. I think I can do better than them in many cases. That’s what gives me the enthusiasm to do something like that down the line, and it’s a fun thing to shoot for.”

Besides film commitments, Schwarzenegger said he would rather wait to seek office till his four children with wife Maria Shriver are older.

Back in the groove

Schwarzenegger, 54, has had to play some politics with “Collateral Damage,” fielding questions about the propriety of releasing another of his violent thrillers given the war on terrorism. In “Collateral Damage,” Schwarzenegger plays a Los Angeles firefighter seeking vengeance against the Colombian terrorist whose bomb killed the hero’s wife and son.

The movie had been scheduled for release in October, but Warner Bros. postponed it after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Schwarzenegger and the studio agreed the grieving nation did not need to see fictional terrorism so soon after the carnage at the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

Suitable time has passed to put “Collateral Damage” in theaters, Schwarzenegger said. The attacks and America’s war against terrorists have not deflated the actor’s or the audience’s interest in explosive action films, he said.

“I don’t see the Sept. 11 situation as, ‘OK, now I should pull back on violence,”‘ Schwarzenegger said. “Part of the world is violence, and it always will be. There’s a certain amount of audience out there that enjoys this type of movie, and a certain amount of audience that enjoys when they see me in these kinds of movies.”

But if the audience isn’t there for that kind of movie, he said, “I’m just as happy making a comedy like ‘Twins’ or ‘Kindergarten Cop.”‘

Heroic action roles have been his staple, but the former bodybuilding champ broadened his big-screen appeal with those two comedy hits. His other light films, “Junior” and “Jingle All the Way,” failed to click, though. And when he went villainous in “Batman & Robin,” it was the least successful of the four modern “Batman” flicks.

Box-office hopefuls

After beginning his film career in 1970 with the campily awful “Hercules in New York,” in which an American voice was dubbed in place of his thick Austrian accent, Schwarzenegger gained attention for the 1977 bodybuilding documentary “Pumping Iron.”

Along with Bruce Willis and Sylvester Stallone, Schwarzenegger defined the action hero in the 1980s and early ’90s. He followed his role as the merciless machine assassin in “The Terminator” with good-guy turns in “Commando,” “Predator” and “Total Recall.”

“Terminator 2: Judgment Day” presented him as a benevolent cyborg. “True Lies” with Schwarzenegger as a spy by day, doting dad by night became his second-biggest hit after the “Terminator” sequel.

The luster of the lone, invincible warrior dulled in the late ’90s as moviegoers embraced brooding, idea-driven thrillers such as “The Matrix.” Willis has moved to drama and comedy lately, while Stallone has been unable to pack theaters for years.

Schwarzenegger has stuck to his guns, scoring with “Eraser” in 1996 but mustering weak receipts for his last two thrillers, “End of Days” and “The 6th Day.”

“Collateral Damage” might turn that around. Viewers may be in the mood to see a noble fireman take down a renegade terrorist in light of the heroics of New York firefighters on Sept. 11 and the hunt for Osama bin Laden.

“The delay has made the film more significant. It won’t be treated as a light action movie,” said “Collateral Damage” director Andrew Davis. “The images of Arnold as a fireman in a collapsing building, saving lives in the opening, the loss of his family and his journey to find this man who can’t be found. The parallels now make it more substantive.”

Even the film’s title, which refers to civilian casualties, has greater resonance because of the Sept. 11 victims and unintentional deaths in U.S. military strikes in Afghanistan, Schwarzenegger said.

The new relevance of “Collateral Damage” aside, reprising his hottest roles promises Schwarzenegger’s biggest audiences since the mid-’90s. A third “Terminator” film is the project fans ask about most often, he said, and following with “True Lies 2” would give Schwarzenegger a major one-two box-office punch.

Looking to the future

Schwarzenegger appears fit and ready for more action roles. He said he’s almost fully recovered from a motorcycle accident last December that broke six ribs and put him in the hospital for four days.

Smoking a cigar during the interview, Schwarzenegger said he also he has been in good health after undergoing surgery to replace a heart valve in 1997.

“Terminator 3” starts shooting in April, with Schwarzenegger again playing a cyborg that comes back in time to save the world from its future machine rulers. Jonathan Mostow (“U-571”) takes over as director from James Cameron, who made the first two “Terminator” films and “True Lies.”

Schwarzenegger remains politically active, pushing an initiative he hopes to have on the California ballot this fall to budget $550 million in state money for after-school programs.

A run for governor is at least four years away, though.

“That’s the great thing about this country, that as a foreigner, ‘Mr. Schwarzen-Schnitzel,”‘ he said with a laugh, “I can come here and say, ‘Maybe some day I’m going to run this state.’ It’s a big state. Then we can buy Austria.”