Kristin Scott Thomas

Most films seem to be about a man and a women falling in love at some point and once you pass forty-five, it's almost disgusting to fall in love.

We older women in Europe are lucky not to be shoved away in a drawer.

There's something incredibly sexy about sand and sweat and dunes photographed like women's backs.

I'm very wary of trust, you see.

As a younger actor you want to be approved of, you want to gain respect, be admired. All of those things. To say: 'This is me playing this character. And aren't I fantastic!' I don't feel that so much now.

French is a foreign language, but I've been speaking it since I was 18 so it's second nature to me.

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

Movies make you immortal and ageless.

Making films can be absolutely fantastic, but it can also be incredibly dull. You spend the whole day sitting by yourself in your trailer and then you get called to deliver one sentence - then you're told to come back and do it again at 5:30 the following morning.

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.

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 just get so fed up with seeing the same things written about me. If I see the words 'ice queen' attached to me, I feel like banging my head against the wall. There's this perception that I can only be in a film if I have a glass of champagne in my hand and a stately home in the background.

With the theatre, your whole day is geared towards the evening's show, and that's the job. People usually go to work about 9 and come home around 5, or maybe 7.

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

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.

I think in most jobs, you get better as you get older. You gain experience, you gain knowledge.

If you're feeling insecure and you need to feel special, the best place to go is somewhere foreign where people treat you as special because you're different.

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

In fact, in many ways my mother was quite hippy-dippy, serving macrobiotic food and reading 'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.'