I think acting is about forgetting yourself in order to give the best of yourself. It’s passing through you more than you’re creating it. You’re not the flower, but the vase which holds the flower.

Being a famous actress may give you a sense of being important, but believe me, it’s just an illusion.

Each new film is like a trial. Before I step in front of the camera, I do not know whether I am going to fall or whether I am going to fly – and that is exactly the way I want it to stay.

I think it’s the same simple thing for everyone – to be happy, and have love in your life.

I never felt being an actor or making a movie was an easy thing to do.

I won’t do something just for the sake of working.

I live for the present always. I accept this risk. I don’t deny the past, but it’s a page to turn.

Maybe it’s because my mother divorced and my grandmother divorced, so maybe I’m frightened deep down. But then I also feel there is no real need. Why do I need to get married? To reassure me? No I don’t need reassurance.

Movies are open doors, and at every door, I change character and life.

My only ambition is to be true every moment I am living.

Choosing to be in the theatre was a way to put my roots down somewhere with other people. It was a way to choose a new family.

What I love most about this crazy life is the adventure of it.

You must understand, I don’t have to be happy to be happy.

If you have everything, then you don’t want to go on. It’s the lacking that makes you search for something better.

My ambition is to have beautiful encounters, not to make money.

I was so happy when they cast me in Chocolat, because it’s one of my vices.

I sometimes feel like I could do another job. Anything. Maybe because as an actress you’re playing different characters, everything feels possible.

I like travelling and if I have to come to Hollywood to make a movie I will, but otherwise I’d never move there. It’s very much an industry town and that doesn’t really interest me.

I would have loved to have met Marilyn Monroe and have dinner with her.

As an actress we don’t beat one another. It’s whoever’s right for the part.

It’s never been my purpose to become an American icon, or more famous or richer.

I try to see my films just once. it’s like a dream you’ve been through when it’s been intense, and you just have to go through it once more just to make sure you’ve had it.

What makes a person sexy is when he’s not trying to be sexy.

But I’ve never felt that being an actress is being in a comfortable place. It’s seen from the outside that we’re being driven in big cars and having these gorgeous suites and all of that. But come on, it’s not about that.

I believe that being an actress or being involved in a movie has to be a life experience, otherwise why go for it? I have to change me, and I have to learn things, and I have to push me and my limits. By acting, I find a freedom inside of a prison in a way.

People think actors have such glamorous lives, but the truth is actors go where nobody wants to go.

Attraction is beyond our will or ideas sometimes.

Acting is a tough business, and you need to be in good shape mentally and physically.

For me, habit is just a synonym for death.

I’m not obsessed by looks. I think you can become a prisoner of your own image.

I don’t believe in coincidence.

I’ve never thought of my characters as being sad. On the contrary, they are full of life. They didn’t choose tragedy. Tragedy chose them.

Before I thought there was a common denominator between my films – as if all my characters were sisters – but I’m not so sure now.

But, you know, when I choose a film I need to believe in it and believe I can do something special with it, and after a while that means not trying to judge or analyze why I should do it. You have to follow this intuition thing, which is a mystery to me.

But I think it’s a little different in Europe, because 40 is really the best age for a woman. That’s when we hit our peak and become this ripe fruit.

There was probably something as a child I wanted to express, something unsaid that I needed to share.

I would say I’m humanly engaged.

Oh, I’ll be forgotten too, don’t worry.

I think I am pretty much melancholic.

I think acting is about forgetting yourself in order to give the best of yourself. It’s passing through you more than you’re creating it. You’re not the flower, but the vase which holds the flower.