The 'Stand Up' sides of Pacino and Walken

Christopher Walken and Al Pacino are known for taking on "tough guy" roles, and that doesn't change in their just released movie, "Stand Up Guys."

The legendary actors team up in the crime-comedy to play two ex-criminals and best friends working to get the old gang back together. They want to have a final hurrah before one of them takes on his final assignment: to kill his comrade.

Yet despite playing old gangsters with softer, "stand up" sides in the film, Walken and Pacino tell CNN they're really not tough guys at heart.

"No, I'm not scary," Walken said with a smile. "Ask anybody."

The actor, who has appeared in more than 100 movies, went on to explain that he's not picky when selecting roles. He prefers to focus on performing rather than hobbies or travel, but he reveals that he is accompanied by one special companion when he takes trips for work.

"I have a cat when I travel," Walken said. "She's got a really nice box with a fuzzy floor, and I've always thought being an actor is a little bit like that. They put you in a box and then you're always being watched."

Pacino similarly balks at being considered a "bad guy."

"The toughest thing about me? Well, I'm still here," he said.

Many look up to the star for playing mob boss Michael Corleone in "The Godfather" or gangster Tony Montana in "Scarface," but Pacino's role models come from his family.

"My granddad, grandmother and mother raised me, so my granddad was a great guy, and I loved him, and I'm totally here because of him," he said.

Pacino's parents split before he was two years old, and his father was away at war and rarely present in his life.

"I never saw him much, so like all kids and especially boys who don't have a dad, they find a substitute, and my grandfather was [that]," Pacino said. "Throughout life as I went on, there was always this kind of father-figure there. Whether it was Lee Strasberg, or Joseph Papp, or Charlie Laughton. But finally, when I've been a father ... I've stopped looking for that substitute, I think."