An actor works with their soul and their thought.
When I did 'The Passion,' nobody believed in the movie. Everybody was telling me, 'You shouldn't do this movie... But I wanted to play Mary Magdalene. I thought that I could do something strong and deep with this character.
I'm not a movie star. I'm just an actress.
When a relationship doesn't work anymore, it's terrible to stay with someone that you don't love.
When I first met Sam Mendes, I was a bit confused and said to him, 'I'm 50 years old. What am I going to do at 50 in a Bond film?'
I like to be in the spotlight once in a while, and then I like to be in the shadows. It's really regenerating.
I don't know Hollywood very well. I've never lived in Los Angeles or New York. But what I can see in Paris, where I live, is that actresses like Catherine Deneuve, Isabelle Huppert, Charlotte Rampling, still get the chance to play strong, sexy roles even though they're not 20.
I do acupuncture. Because it really helps. It is the opposite of Botox. Botox blocks, and acupuncture moves.
In France, they call the beauty of youth 'the evil beauty.' You don't have it because of you but because you're born with it. The other kind of beauty is your own work, and it takes forever.
British people don't express when they are in pain. They don't think it's elegant.
Wherever I go, I am Italian. The way I talk, the way I eat, the way femininity is important to me. The way I love Italian food.
I went to a modeling agency and said I wanted to be a model. I worked, worked, worked so much while I was studying.
I was very shy as a girl. Absurdly shy, even. Maybe because I was an only child. And I think that's why I'm so happy to have two kids now.
Mel is a great director because he's not just a director, he's an actor, so he knows how to direct actors. I loved working with him. He's great as a director. He's so intelligent. He's generous. I really loved him.
My body is very shaped, and I like to be simple. I don't like to use so many colors. My best colors are black, white and blue.
I'm a European, and I live there. I work in European films, and then once in a while, I make an American movie.
If you have a script that's not great, if you have a great director, you can make a great movie, but if you have a great script with a director who's not good, never are you going to have a good movie.
Lipstick is the most valuable weapon in a woman's make-up kit. It has the power to transform the appearance and mood of the person wearing it, and, at the same time, arouses the admiration of everybody else.
I have no idea how I'm perceived in America because I don't live the reality of America.
Listen, I had two kids - one when I was 40, one when I was 45. I breastfed for one year, which means I was breastfeeding four years ago. I'm going to move from giving birth to menopause without really realising.
Truly, I am a woman of the last minute. When I was pregnant, I organised three different hospitals because I couldn't decide where I wanted to have my baby: London, Rome or Paris. In the end, I decided to go to Rome, arrived on the Monday and gave birth on the Saturday.
Do you know who I would love to play? Morticia Addams - then I could use all that darkness to be funny.
I like to do on screen what I'm not in life. In life, I'm much more weak and insecure, and so then you know I like to play characters that are stronger than me.
For me, true beauty has nothing to do with wrinkles and everything to do with the fact that my maternal grandmother raised five children just after the war and remained a fighter throughout her life. True beauty is the slick of red lipstick my paternal grandmother would put on before going to church on Sunday.
We had a moment in the '40s and '50s, where female characters were very strong in film, where these incredible roles were written for women like Joan Crawford, like Bette Davis. But then there was a space of time where - I don't know why - it wasn't like that. It became difficult for women to find certain roles after a certain age.
Sometimes when we think about femininity, we think also fragile. But I think you can be feminine and very strong. I think make-up goes with that femininity. I think it's a natural gesture for women and one they do more for themselves than for others.
