"I was very impressed by him, and I was full of desire. And because of my needs, I was shocked by his short way of responding sometimes on the set, because he was trying to create something special, he was in his world, and I was expecting he would be like a teacher in class - teaching the actor. I didn`t know the teacher wouldn`t give a s- about me! (laughs). ... When I think about it years after, I think it was a great lesson. I do remember him being generous, money-wise, and when you`re a young actress, you remember the people treating you well, and that meant a great deal at the time, because I had very little money." (on working with Godard)

"Exposure is a choice, a commitment to others. The red carpet, the photographers - they are not always easy to live with, but I have to deal with it."

"It was like a huge family. We would do very few takes - most of the time just one, and we would laugh a lot. ... I miss him a lot, of course. He was an adorable, intelligent man." (Speaking about director Krzysztof Kieslowski)

I start with almost an emptiness. The experience of jumping into an intimate place is where it`s exciting. So it doesn`t matter which way you`re doing it, what matters is expressing yourself. That`s the core to me. That`s why if someone told me `you will never act again,` I would be OK with that, because there are other ways of expressing yourself."

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

For me, habit is just a synonym for death.

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

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

Attraction is beyond our will or ideas sometimes.

I would say I`m humanly engaged.

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.

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.

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

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

As an actress we don`t beat one another. It`s whoever`s right for the part.

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

Going to South Africa (Country of My Skull (2004)) has changed me utterly. I have seen and heard about acts of cruelty and hatred which are hard to comprehend. But I`ve also seen peace and tranquility like nowhere else on earth.

I learned a lot last year about the current difficulties in independent film making. Money is promised one minute and gone the next. I was bitterly disappointed about Scheherazade. It was one of the best scripts I have ever read.

I live for the present always. I accept this risk. I don`t deny the past, but it`s a page to turn.

I don`t believe in coincidence.

You must understand, I don`t have to be happy to be happy.

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

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

Oh, I`ll be forgotten too, don`t worry.

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

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.

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

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

I won`t do something just for the sake of working.

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

If you have everything, then you don`t want to go on. It`s the lacking that makes you search for something better.

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

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

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.

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.

I think I am pretty much melancholic.

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

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.

I have been proposed to four times. Twice at the beginning of a relationship and twice at the end of a relationship. I`ve never said no. I just didn`t give an answer!

"My real excitement comes when a movie transforms me. When you love the movie you`ve played in, you can make that bridge back to your own life."

"My earliest memory is loneliness. That`s a hard thing to live with"

"French women bloom at 40! I can`t wait!"

"If a star is someone who gives light, then I can be a star. But if a star is someone who goes after money and magazine covers then it`s sick and I don`t want it!"

"I want to make films that are political and social. Films with a message or an idea. Films that dare to ask."

"Acting is like peeling an onion. You have to peel away each layer to reveal another."

"I knew I had become a star when I shook hands with Simone Signoret at the 1985 Cannes Film Festival. She died four months later".

"I am not a great French woman. George Sand, Marguerite Duras and Simone de Beauvoir are great French women".

"Giving birth is like a vase of beautiful flowers. Only you`re just the vase, and only for a very short moment. The flowers are beautiful, but they belong to themselves, not to the vase."

"When I returned to France after winning the Oscar, I was treated like royalty, or like a football hero!"

"Movies are open doors, and at every door, I change character and life...I live for the present always. I accept this risk. I don`t deny the past, but it`s a page to turn."