The body, in 'La Belle Noiseuse,' was the source of the artist's creativity.

I don't see my old films, but I think of the characters I played as friends, like the women I meet in my life who made strong impressions on me. I remember them and they are part of me.

I wouldn't say I was a rebel as such, but I certainly wasn't right at school.

I can't just react on the strength of an email and three pages of synopsis, and say I'm going to take off for three months of my life.

I'm less desperate now to express what's inside me, that's true - I act these days because it keeps me awake and interested, an eternal student.

I don't always see my movies right away. And there are some I haven't seen at all. Sometimes that bothers the directors, so I'm obliged to see them.

Very often with an American movie, the end is very happy and you just feel good when you go out. When you go to a French movie, it's kind of like, "oh!", and you can't go out; you're stuck in your chair. It goes so deeply inside of the heart.