I'm not one of those famous people flying round the world emoting over every catastrophe. I'm too feeble.

The Cannes film festival is about big-budget films but also remarkable films made in different political regimes by film-makers with little resources.

I really like acting in French. It's actually quite different for me, from acting in English. It's fun acting in a foreign language. You're liberated or freed from preconceptions.

Often, the roles I'm offered in England are melancholic women who are filled with regret for the past, regret for their fading beauty.

I do a film because I like the story and I want to give life to a character - I don't necessarily have to agree with the director.

I know people think that I always play these characters who are in control and can chop someone's head off with a look.

I try to make films that I find exciting. It makes me want to get out of bed at five in the morning, have my make-up done and play for the rest of the day.

It doesn't make you feel very good being mean and fierce; it is much nicer playing people who are kind and sweet.

I can't move back to England. My home is in France now. I'd love to but I can't. My family's all there now.

The problem with being a film actress or a movie star is that people see you so huge that somehow you're visually massive or somehow you're in some removed space, which is a television or wherever. It somehow takes your humanity.

Having a career is a bit like navigating an Atlantic crossing - you have to make sure everything is keeping and is balanced.

'The English Patient' was a huge turning point in my career and my life; it became this huge thing. But the whole Oscar build-up got completely out of control; I spent more time talking about that film than I spent making it!

I like the idea that I'm making things that people might think and argue about.

I have never met a woman who works who doesn't feel guilty. I mean we all deny it like crazy but deep down there is always that voice saying you should be at home.

I mean, my father was killed when I was six. And I only have tiny, tiny flashes of memory.

I still absolutely love 'The Sound of Music' and anything with Julie Andrews in it.

If you are a successful actor, which is what I am, then you tend to get labelled very quickly and easily.

I'm very wary of trust, you see.

Sometimes, I think I could have been a major movie star with the vast mansion and staff. I look at my Volvo and think it could be a limousine. I think of the roles I turned down. But then I wouldn't have had any children.

When I speak English, I've been told, I have this patrician way of speaking that's very irritating. It's the whole class thing.

I am sure that, had I grown up with both parents, had I grown up in a safe environment, had I grown up with a feeling of safety rather than danger, I would not be the way I am.

Now, playing a love interest can be really thrilling, if you're working opposite thrilling people.

I'm a bit of a Doubting Thomas - always worrying about things.

As an adult, it's a huge shock to be orphaned; as a child it's just hideous, ghastly.