Imagine this scenario: You're one of the hottest directors in the music video business, having worked with the likes of Aerosmith, Jennifer Lopez, Will Smith, Gwen Stefani, Destiny's Child, Justin Timberlake and Britney Spears, but you're essentially back at square one when your handed the helm for your first film.

Talk about pressure.

Then the film happens to be "Constantine," based on the "Hellblazer" comic book series that has a faithful fan foundation with heavenly expectations of what the big-screen version should be.

Talk about hellish pressure.

But Francis Lawrence can handle it. Lord knows he's been to hell and back working with some of music's finest. No, he's not naming names and don't even begin to guess. The list of megastars he's worked with is endless.

"I've actually started to ask the musicians I work with, lately, whether or not they like to make music videos -- what their favorite part of the process is," Lawrence told me in a recent @ The Movies interview. "For the most part, and I understand it now, it's just that they want to be in the studio or on stage performing, they don't want to be making a music video.

"For most of them, it's just a marketing tool and some, they're such performers they absolutely love it, they get into the process and then it's just a joy to make a music video," he added. "But for the people who don't want to be there, and they're late or not present, it's no fun."

Lawrence said he definitely had fun directing Keanu Reeves in "Constantine," opening nationwide on Friday. For fans of the DC Comics/Vertigo creation, Lawrence assures that he didn't totally reinvent the wheel -- but there are some obvious changes in the supernatural thriller.

"There are two things that closely resemble it," Lawrence said. "One is the heart of who Constantine is -- the smoking, the attitude, the world-weary guy he is, with the sarcasm and the cynicism. He has sort of a distaste for the way the universe works -- that's really close."

And he said, the storyline regarding Constantine's chain-smoking habit, which I won't reveal here, is pulled from a series of "Hellblazer" comics.

But then come the changes.

"In the comics, he's blonde and British, and in the film, he's obviously American and has dark hair," Lawrence said. "Also, Chas (his apprentice, played by Shia LeBeouf) is a little bit older in the comic book than he is in the film, and most of the comics are based in England but he does travel the world. The film is set in Los Angeles."

Reeves plays the title character of John Constantine, an exorcist with an attitude. Years before, he attempted suicide but was resuscitated by God, who sent him back to earth to protect the borders of heaven and hell. They are plenty of "half-breed" souls that he has ability to see -- some half-angels, some half-demons -- and his job is to send the half-breed demons back to the depths of where they came from. If he keeps doing his job, it's his feeling that he will "buy" his way into heaven.

But when Constantine notices a difference during one of his exorcism, that a demon in full form is trying to break through into the physical world -- he knows he's got a much bigger problem on his hands. Compounding the problem is the bad news Constantine's received about his fate.

The interesting thing about "Constantine" is that it tackles two controversial subjects -- smoking and suicide -- that seemingly make the film a target for protest groups. But the truth of the matter is, "Constantine" isn't meant to glorify either. In fact, the film makes it quite clear that both are very, very bad things.

"There's nothing I can say really say to people who protest because they're going to think what they're going to think on certain things, and all I can do is go out and make the movie that I think is really interesting -- make a movie that I don't think is irresponsible," Lawrence said.

Lawrence said he's certain that some groups are going to hate that there's smoking in it, even though it results in some devastating consequences.

The suicide issue, however, is a little stickier. That's because he enters religion into the fray.

"Some people are going to hate that we have suicides in it just because you should never have suicides on screen, but other people will say there is a price to pay if you commit suicide," Lawrence said.

The director was smart in his approach to making "Constantine," in that he worked with the Catholic church to make sure he got the details right.

CONSTANTINE Hounsou Interview Lawrence Interview Slideshow Trailer Clip: 'I Need To Use The Chair' Clip: 'Cats Are Good' Contest

"We had a Catholic priest look at the script to see if anything was really outlandish when dealing with stuff that exists, like passages from the bible or anything Constantine might read to someone during an exorcism or their last rites in Latin. We wanted to be as accurate as possible," Lawrence explained. "The priest's only criticism of the film was that we made the church feel old-fashioned, and that was because a priest in the film wouldn't give a character in the film a Catholic funeral because she committed suicide. That's not a modern view of the Catholic church."

When it came to interpreting hell for the movie, Lawrence came up with his vision of it on his own. For those who have been to cinematic hell before, chances are pretty good that you'll find Lawrence's interpretation of it fresh, as well as frightening.

"When I first read the script, it was sort of described as this black void. I said, 'OK, that's really boring, so let me come up with something else,'" Lawrence recalled. "Anything else that I came up with that's abstract is just going to be a version of the stuff I've seen before."

What it really needed, Lawrence observed, was "a weird new sort of logic to it."

"That's where I came up with this idea that, wherever you exist at any given point, there's a heaven version of where you are and a hell version of where you are -- they're all parallel worlds," Lawrence concluded. "What it did was it gave hell a geography when you crossed over into it, which made it a little more relatable and tangible. It opened things up visually and gave us a landscape to work with."