AceShowbiz - Billy Bob Thornton has dispelled rumors he wore a vial of Angelina Jolie's blood around his neck, blaming the public image of the couple as "vampires" for the bizarre story. Thornton married the actress in 2000 and they frequently made headlines with reports about their love life, including speculation they kept one another's blood in tiny bottles.

But the "Armageddon" star insists their relationship was not so eccentric - the pair actually wore lockets with small smears of blood. He tells Britain's Total Film magazine, "(There are rumours that) I wear blood around my neck and all that horses**t. (It was) a clear locket you'd put your grandmother's picture in. That's what we had, Angelina and I. And it was her idea that we literally prick our fingers and rub the blood on the glass in the locket and wear it."

"If it had been Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, it would have been the most romantic story: this amazing couple that loved each other so much that when they were apart they would have these lockets where they'd pricked their fingers, like blood brothers. Angie and I do it and we're these vampire blood-sucking creatures who wear tanks of blood around our necks."