The work I did in Vertigo meant nothing if no one cared about the movie. Luckily, Vertigo had a revival and people had begun to recognize there was something special and it gained in reputation. But it just as well could have ended up rotting in film cans somewhere.

I had a lot of resentment for a while toward Kim Novak. But I don't mind her anymore. She's okay. We've become friends. I even asked her before this trip for some beauty tips.

The script was always the most important thing to me and I loved the script. For one thing, I've always admired trees. I just worship them. Think what trees have witnessed, what history, such as living through the Civil War, yet they still survive.

The first time I was in his office was when they called me in to tell me they had changed my name. I had a feeling that if I'd gone along with the name they'd chosen, I'd never be seen again. I'd be swallowed up by that name, because it was a false name: Kit Marlowe.

I tried so hard with movies like Vertigo and Middle of the Night and others. I felt those would show me that it's only a matter of time before I'd find the right one to reach out and touch people.

So, Hitchcock wouldn't say anything about my work in the movie but, on the other hand, he wouldn't complain, either.

I live way out in the country, so there's not a lot of people around to remind me. And my friends don't think of me as 'Kim Novak' anymore anyway. It's like they forgot, too. And so it's nice.

I didn't want to start relying on what someone else thought was right. It was easier to go away all together.

It means nothing if the movie doesn't get out there.

We only did probably two, three takes on every scene we did, at the most.

Harry Cohn did not make me. But I also feel that I probably didn't make me, either. I think it was a combination. I think that's what made it work.

If you're wanting glamorous or really beautiful or really sexy, well then, I wasn't really the one, but I could do all of that. You could just get really lost in that kind of image.

Well, I'm Czech, but Polish, Czech, no matter, it's my name.

For every answer, I like to bring up a question. Maybe I'm related to Alfred Hitchcock or maybe I got to know him too well, but I think life should be that way.

I loved acting, which was never about money, the fame. It was about a search for meaning. It was painful.

I was always opinionated.

I don't feel that I was a Hollywood-created star.

I knew Rita Hayworth only enough to know that she was just a tender, sensitive, beautiful human being. A lovely person. Very gentle. She would never stand up for her rights.

I think it will be helpful to people because I know the expectations that are put on you as a sex symbol, and how Marilyn Monroe suffered and so on, and I was able to get free of that.

I used Jimmy to give me what I needed to keep going and to know that I was on the right path with it. I thought I saw Jimmy's soul all the time we worked. He never covered his soul and I never covered mine. We saw into each other's souls, very definitely.

The work I did in Vertigo meant nothing if no one cared about the movie. Luckily, Vertigo had a revival and people had begun to recognize there was something special and it gained in reputation. But it just as well could have ended up rotting in film cans somewhere.

Just touching that old tree was truly moving to me because when you touch these trees, you have such a sense of the passage of time, of history. It's like you're touching the essence, the very substance of life.

My first day at MGM they decided to bring this lion out, male, and it was not the best time for him to see me. All of a sudden he thought I was in heat and this lion went into the dressing room, which was just a trailer on the sound stage, and went crazy.

I always felt Jimmy was trapped in Hollywood. He felt it himself. He loved aviation so much and he wanted to be able to do more of that. He somehow just got stuck here.

My security comes from my senses, my sensing the direction I should go and suddenly I felt out of tune, out of step with what other people wanted or what other people expected of me.

The thing I loved about Alfred Hitchcock is that he left a lot of open ends there, a lot of clues that didn't really add up the way you think they would, and sometimes, not at all.

I don't think you want to give all the answers, but I think every answer you do give should bring up another question, and not all questions should be answered.

As I said, I began losing confidence in my instincts, which is tough and very bad for an instinctive person.

I already hated that gray suit and then having to go through putting on that wig with a false front - again made me feel so trapped inside this person who was desperately wanting to break out of it but she was so caught up in the web of deception that she couldn't.

And I went through a lot of detours and I took a lot of roads and things so yes, that's all there, but it's not meant to be shocking or telltale.

If you want to live on the edge of life you need to be flexible.

My best film composing experience was with Elia Kazan.

I was lucky enough to occasionally break out of that racist situation that prevails in the Hollywood film production community. But it was racist then and it will always be that way. It will never be otherwise.

'Batman' took 10 months to film, and by the time I stopped working on it, it took a long time before my English accent came out again. I was actually having to try for it.

Luck is everything... My good luck in life was to be a really frightened person. I'm fortunate to be a coward, to have a low threshold of fear, because a hero couldn't make a good suspense film.

I still feel that a movie has to attempt to say something - even if it fails miserably. But I've sort of given up on believing that I'm going to change the world with every film I choose to act in.

It's the difficulty we had with Mr. Bean, actually, when it went from TV to film. You certainly discover that you need to explain more about a character.

To make a documentary is one thing, to make a feature film is quite another.

I mean when the play was on in New York I was starting to get film offers coming through, and since the film's come out I get offered more than I used to, but it happens incrementally.

I think it would be very boring dramatically to have a film where everybody was a lawyer or doctor and had no faults. To me, the most important thing is to be truthful.

I like doing them and they're ridiculous and the actors can improvise a lot, and they don't have to be really realistic characters that hit a very specific tone as in a feature film. They're really fun, I want to make more of them definitely.

One of the most interesting aspects of the film project was collaborating with so many people - directors, filmmakers, and writers - over a five-year period. I learned that there are two components to this.

The best thing I can think of would be to create a union between something as beautiful and powerful and wonderful as Hollywood films and a criticism of the status quo. That's my dream, to make such a German film.

If he didn't fall in love he would have never come back near the end of the film. Because, what man is going to dishonor himself so that he comes back in front of the man that took a woman away from him... and warns her to save her life?

Robert Altman's Nashville is my all-time favorite film because it covers all the bases - it's original, moving, and has something to say, but also funny and incredibly entertaining.

I never see a novel as a film while I'm writing it. Mostly because novels and films are so different, and I'm such an internal novelist.

I have a movie coming out called Spun, which will be at the Toronto Film Fest.

Well ironically my last three roles have all been a mother. One was a Canadian film where the baby was taken away because she is a drug addict, in Irish Jam I play a mother to a four year old. I think in the future I'll be able to handle the role with a lot more depth.

And when you see it the first time you put the film together, the roughest cut, is when you want to go home and open up your veins and get in a warm tub and just go away. And then it gradually, maybe, works its way back, somewhere toward that spot you were at before.