Milla Jovovich: ‘Beauty is meaningless if you don’t know who you are’

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Ukrainian-born actress and former model?Milla Jovovich

Milla Jovovich has lived a life いっそう少なく ordinary. The Ukrainian-born actress and former model began working at just nine years old and appeared on magazine covers 発射 by Herb Ritts at 11. She’s appeared in more than 40 movies, 記録，記録的な／記録するd music with her friend Bono, and modelled for Chanel and Dior. She is 価値（がある） £35 million, a 人物／姿／数字 二塁打d if you 含む the 概算の wealth of her husband, screenwriter and director Paul W S Anderson. But that success （機の）カム at a price. Childhood 外傷／ショック, underage sex scenes, 存在 preyed upon by ‘sleazy older men’ and 麻薬 乱用 that nearly killed her.

When we 会合，会う, Milla, 45, is perched on a 妨げる／法廷，弁護士業 stool in her kitchen. Dressed in ジーンズs and a T-shirt, her hair is pulled 支援する from her make-up-解放する／自由な 直面する, 最高潮の場面ing those pale blue-green 注目する，もくろむs. Most interviews with this mother of three girls (Ever, 13, Dashiel, six, and Osian, one) tend to 焦点（を合わせる） on her incredible looks and 人物／姿／数字 (for her new film Monster Hunter she trained for three hours a day and stuck to an 80 per cent 工場／植物-based diet). But as we 雑談（する）, it is （疑いを）晴らす that she’d rather 焦点（を合わせる） on her exhilarating highs and destructive lows, and how she’s 設立する happiness and fulfilment in motherhood と一緒に a man who challenges her to be her best.

Raised in Moscow until she was five, Milla and her actress mother Galina and doctor father Bogdan moved to LA. Unable to find 事実上の／代理 work, Galina took きれいにする 職業s. When she and Bogdan 分裂（する） up a year later, she put her energy into her preternaturally beautiful daughter, soon sending her out to work.

Milla with her director husband Paul and daughter Ever at the 首相 of their film 居住（者） Evil: The Final 一時期／支部

By 12, Milla was an 設立するd model and was 含むd by 伝説の photographer Richard Avedon in Revlon’s Most Unforgettable Women in the World （選挙などの）運動をする. By 13, she landed her first TV 役割 in The Night Train to Kathmandu, and also her movie debut in the erotic thriller Two Moon Junction. At 15, she was fully supporting her family and had been cast opposite 22-year-old 行為／法令／行動する or Brian Krause in Return to the Blue Lagoon. The romance movie 上げるd her 収入s to £1 million and 要求するd her to do her first ? and crucially underage ? sex scenes.

Her memories of that time are only difficult ones. At school she was いじめ（る）d as ‘the Commie’ by classmates 怪しげな of her ロシアの roots; in auditions, knowing she was 存在 chosen for her looks made her feel worthless. It was excruciating. ‘I was so young,’ she says. ‘I was uncomfortable, I was shy, I wasn’t a natural actress. Everything was difficult. I 欠如（する）d 信用／信任 and on 始める，決める I’d be shaking. It was traumatising. And then the reviews would come out and I’d be 侮辱d and obliterated. It was so humiliating. It made me want to turn away from everything.’

An 活動／戦闘 星／主役にする is born ? Milla in The Fifth Element, 1997

And so she did. Partly in 返答 to these bruising 遭遇（する）s but also to her controlling mother, Milla fell in with a bad （人が）群がる. Work slowed as 万引 and drinking took over. ‘I thought my rebelling would 証明する to my mum that you can have fun and success. But there （機の）カム a point in my teens when it got serious. My friends and I were doing 麻薬s and I did too much. I thought I was going to die. I actu 同盟（する） prayed. I said: “God, if you let me wake up tomorrow I’ll never do this again.” I imagined my mother 殺人，大当り herself when she 設立する out and how pointless my life would have been.’

Her 反乱 also manifested itself in her love life. 老年の just 16 she married her Dazed and 混乱させるd co-星／主役にする Shawn Andrews (he was 21) but it was annulled by her mother two months later. Then, at 21, she married 38-year-old Luc Besson, the director of her first 活動／戦闘 movie The Fifth Element, only for that to end in 離婚 within two years.

Given the tender age she was exposed to the shark-pool worlds of modelling and Hollywood, darker moments were to come. ‘Did sleazy older guys 攻撃する，衝突する on me? Of course,’ she says. ‘Did I get together with them? Occasionally. Do I feel like a 犠牲者? No. I was having fun and experiencing different people. I read Balzac and Nana [the story of a high-class 売春婦 by Emile Zola] when I was 13. I was playing characters in my 長，率いる and 会合 sophisticated older men was a game. In some sense, I thought I was a courtesan. But I was little, they shouldn’t have done it and thank god I never got 強姦d ? although you could call it 強姦 because I was underage at the time.’

Milla in her new movie Monster Hunter

Milla says she’s never chosen to tell her story as part of the #MeToo movement out of deference for women who have 苦しむd 外傷／ショック from their experiences with predatory men. ‘I don’t 持つ／拘留する 怒り／怒る. It never 影響する／感情d me. I have always been 安全な・保証する in my sexuality and I was strong. No one drugged or （警官の）巡回区域，受持ち区域 me. I stand together with the #MeToo 犠牲者s and will support them to the end. But I never felt my story was part of it because I wasn’t one of those traumatised women and it was their 発言する／表明するs that needed to be heard.’ She shakes her 長，率いる. ‘Maybe it’s because I’m more European, but that’s the way it was for me.’

No 疑問 then she was worried when her daughter, Ever, followed her into the 産業. In 2016, 老年の nine, her dad Paul cast her as the younger 見解／翻訳／版 of Alicia (who Milla plays) in his film 居住（者） Evil: The Final 一時期／支部. Next year she will play Wendy opposite Jude 法律 in a new 見解／翻訳／版 of Peter Pan. Has Milla tried to dissuade her? ‘I was against Paul putting her in the movie but…’ she shakes her 長，率いる. ‘Ever just loves it. She was five when she said she 手配中の，お尋ね者 to 行為／法令／行動する. I was 決定するd it wasn’t going to happen. I told her she couldn’t read yet, so there wasn’t anything to consider and that year she went up two grades and said she 手配中の，お尋ね者 to go for auditions. I told her it wasn’t 平易な, and tried to put her off but she was 決定するd.’

With both parents in the movie 産業, Ever stands a better chance than most. Milla credits husband Paul ? who she met in 2002 on the 始める，決める of the first 居住（者） Evil (his 一連の films based on a popular ビデオ game, which 固く結び付けるd Milla’s position as an 活動／戦闘 hero) ? with her newfound family 安定. ‘He changed me,’ she says. ‘He’s made me more 患者. I feel luc ky because he’s a 役割 model to me. He’s smart, 静める, 論理（学）の… I love that.’

She 会談 about visiting his family in Newcastle, where he’s from, revelling in walks on the 素晴らしい Northumberland coast and the life-changing moment of discovering the パン屋 Greggs. No, really. ‘Have you had a Greggs’ pasty?’ she says in a トン of 近づく reverence. ‘I was on this very strict diet after I had Ever,’ she laughs, ‘Soups, salads, no carbs, the usual blah blah blah. I was doing 宣伝の work in Paris and didn’t touch a 選び出す／独身 baguette. I went to Italy and didn’t eat a bit of pasta. And then we went to Newcastle, I saw Greggs and bought 24 pasties. They put them in a box and I FaceTimed my trainer who couldn’t believe what he was seeing!’

Milla with Brian Krause in Return to the Blue Lagoon, 1991

Her husband is 予定 home any minute. She tells me she is more proud of her marriage and family than anything. With characteristic honesty, she 収容する／認めるs, though, it hasn’t always been plain sailing. ‘関係s aren’t 平易な. At first there’s so much passion and sex and it’s any time, any place, anywhere and then years pass and you think, “Where’s it gone?” There have been times we could have sp lit but we both want this and 堅いd it out.’ I assume, given her looks, she doesn’t need to try too hard to keep the passion alive. ‘Passion has nothing to do with looks but mystery, keeping something 支援する. I keep a bit of myself apart from Paul. I have my music, I paint, I do things that don’t 伴う／関わる him that 吸収する me, and he has his and we like that about each other. Beauty doesn’t last and it doesn’t mean anything if you don’t know who you are.’

And Milla Jovovich, actress, mother and Hollywood 生存者, is 驚くべき／特命の／臨時の.

• Monster Hunter will be in cinemas from 18 June?

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