Starting with a party scene for 600 cast and end up singing on top of a giant elephant...does it get any better than this?

The other two things are... well, I had a huge appetite for old black and white movies on BBC 2. At the weekends they used to run matinees, and the more romantic the better.

When you take the R sound out of French accent, and you just replace it with an R, it sounds Mexican.

...as an actor there`s nothing better than a great moody moment to play with nothing to say. It`s so much easier to do because you can really get inside your head.

There's something that happens where you go, if you're lucky, goodness me, from film to another film to another film. And you can sort of feel that if you step off that treadmill, it might all go horribly wrong and you might never be employed again, you know. And I suddenly thought that that's not necessarily the case. And I also thought we make drama as actors about people in the world and that if you are on that treadmill, you start making films about other films.

A million pounds sounds like a lot of money now that I'm saying it. But in terms of moviemaking, it's not a lot of money. And yet you can see what can be done with that, with the talent of a great cinematographer and great director and actors.

I think my home is in that sort of the part of cinema that's disappeared is where I lived, that sort of mid-budget you know, drama. I suppose that's what I am known for.