Angelina Jolie wore one of her late mother's necklaces in Couture

She told Variety she had worn her mother's necklace on the shoot for comfort and added: "I felt very vulnerable.

"I feel like it's such a personal film. It felt so private that in my mind, it's probably the one film that doesn't feel like a film."

The 50-year-old actress - who underwent a preventive double mastectomy because she carried the BRCA1 gene in 2013 - knew making the movie would "bring up many personal things" but she found it a "healing" experience.

She said: "I have always found the heaviest films tend to have the most loving sets. There's something quite comforting about having real conversations and having real feelings with a shared community.

"It was quite healing in many ways because you look at the other faces of the people on the set, because one in three people have cancer, and most everybody's been in a hospital room with somebody they've loved. Everybody on set has lost someone they've loved.

"You recognise that life is fragile and time goes quickly, and people pass away that we can't imagine the world could exist without... It's hard not to feel very close to a crew and other actors in this kind of a piece."

Angelina also learned to speak French for the movie, which director Alice Wincour praised her for.

The actress admitted: "I was also nervous speaking French."

Alice added: "She really immersed herself in the part and was obsessed with the idea of speaking French, even more than me.

"Her mother was French, so there were many things that were very intimate. She really dedicated herself to the movie."

The director always had Angelina in mind for the role.

She said: "I thought it would be interesting to show her fragility and the woman behind the icon. What I love about Angelina is that she's in the Hollywood system, but at the same time, she's a kind of a rebel, a rebel to the authority."