Michael Caine Clarifies He Isn't Retiring from Acting After All

Michael Caine ain't hanging it up just yet in the acting department -- this despite the fact that he strongly suggested he would be ... doing a 180, which has fans sighing with relief.

The legendary British actor clarified what his future professional plans were Saturday ... saying he is NOT retiring, while his rep also tells Variety that he's actually reading two scripts right now for potential projects down the road.

MC tweeted, "I haven't retired and not a lot of people know that." He also issued a more formal statement saying he's been waking up at 6 AM for 50 years to make movies, and he has no intention of chucking his alarm clock now.

The about-face stance comes about 24 hours after he caused a firestorm of sadness among movie lovers, telling a couple BBC radio hosts on "Kermode and Mayo's Film Review" that he hadn't worked in 2 years, and that he wasn't able to walk very well because of his health.

When asked directly if this upcoming feature of his, "Best Sellers," would be his last role ... the dude said yeah, probably. He noted he hadn't gotten any good offers for roles of late, and pointed out that he's 88 ... acknowledging there aren't too many films with 88-year-old leads.

Seems he's had a complete change of heart overnight, because he's totally backtracking now and saying he's gonna keep at it ... which, we're sure, fans of his are overjoyed to hear.