Angelina Jolie was swiftly made to answer on the chaotic political landscape in her native U.S. at a press conference for her new film, Couture.
Alongside director Alice Winocour and the cast of Couture ahead of the film’s European premiere at the San Sebastian Film Festival in northern Spain Sunday night, the Oscar-winning actress admitted she wanted to be careful about what she said on the topic.
“It’s a very difficult question,” the Maria star began. “I have to say that I love my country and I don’t, at this time, recognize my country. I’ve always lived internationally. My family is international. My life, my world view, is equal [and] united. Anything, anywhere that divides or limits personal expressions and freedoms [for anyone] I think is very dangerous,” she added. “I think these are such serious times that we have to be careful not to say things casually. So I’ll be careful in a press conference… But these are very, very heavy times.”
Couture stars Jolie as Maxine, a forty-something American film director tasked with making a short piece of work for a Paris Fashion Week show. Amidst the glitz and chaos of fashion’s most frenzied week on the calendar, Maxine is diagnosed with breast cancer, an experience the actress herself has also had to make decisions on, given her family history of cancer. Jolie had a preventative double mastectomy in 2013.
“I did choose to have that because I lost my mother and my grandmother very young, and I have the BRCA1 gene,” Jolie said, “so I chose to have that a decade ago.”
“Those are my choices,” she continued. “I don’t say everybody should do it that way, but it’s important to have the choice. As Alice said, it’s uniting for not just women, of course, but anybody who’s gone through something [similar].”
Jolie was emotional when asked a question about wearing her mother’s necklace in the film, who died at age 56 from ovarian cancer in 2007. “It’s very hard to speak about my mother,” she said. “You would love my mother. I did wear my mother’s necklace. I also wore her ashes… I think probably everybody in this room has been sitting in a hospital room — maybe some of you have been through heavier things.”
“I wish that she had this community,” she continued. “I wish she was able to speak more openly and people respond as graciously as you have and not feel as alone. I think she would have told Maxine to live every day and focus on life and don’t take anything at home for granted. Sorry if I didn’t answer [properly], but I’m very emotional.”
The movie examines how Maxine’s life intersects with two others: Ada, a young model from South Sudan (Anyier Anei) who escapes a fraught future only to end up in a more frivolous environment, and Angèle (Ella Rumpf), a French makeup artist who dreams of being a writer. Garrel stars as Maxine’s cinematographer, who she strikes up a relationship with.
The San Sebastian International Film Festival 2025 runs Sept. 19-27.