Yes. Otherwise I could have done a lot of Hollywood movies. After Crouching Tiger I got a lot of offers, but I turned them down because they were all victim roles - poor girls sold to America to be a wife or whatever. I know I have the ability to go deeper, to take on more original roles than that.

Chinese women are much more modest than American women when it comes to clothes. We tend to show less flesh.

For myself I don't like the geisha look. It's like a mask.

When two people first meet, they can only have a very ordinary kind of friendship. But when you begin to understand each other, when you get close to them, you discover that you're suddenly eager to know him or her even better.

They're not willing to admit that I've also shed blood and tears and often paid dearly for my success. This makes me feel extremely sad.

Actually I ran away from school when I was 13. No one could find me, and the police were called. I was just hiding in a little thicket of grass at my school, and went to sleep.

Ordinarily if an actor gets chosen for the lead in a film, he or she has already built up a repertoire, and everyone knows what he or she is capable of.