After having had supporting roles in The Dark Knight Rises and in Christopher Nolan’s 2010 blockbuster Inception, Joseph Gordon-Levitt seems eager to head his own big action movie. He stars in two action movies that open shortly.

In Premium Rush, the modestly budgeted thriller that opens Aug. 24, he plays a bike messenger who is chased across Manhattan by a dirty cop trying to intercept a package.

In case that isn’t a bold enough statement to certify his new action brand, next up is Looper, which opens a month later. In that higher profile science-fiction action film, Gordon-Levitt both co-stars with Bruce Willis and plays a younger version of Willis who, in the twisted time-travel plot, has been ordered to assassinate himself.

No matter how you slice it, after this year you won’t be able to think of Gordon-Levitt in quite the same way again. Yes, he may continue to play doe-eyed romantics and the occasional supporting role – and let’s hope he doesn’t leave interesting indies behind – but if these movies do well Gordon-Levitt will have added an important new line to his resume: Action leading man.

This featurette puts the emphasis squarely on the action in Premium Rush, in which he plays a bicycle messenger on the run from Michael Shannon. The video is all about the unbelievable, death-defying bicycle stunts that the movie features. Yes, Gordon-Levitt has a stunt double, but as you can see from one bloody scene in this video, the star did some of his own stunts.

As Gordon-Levitt shows his bleeding arm to the camera, you can hear someone off-screen tell him that, seriously, they should head to the hospital.