Australian star Naomi Watts may be stuck in a bygone era once again, but her latest film was a labour of love, she tells Joanna Hunkin
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Battered and bruised from a gruelling film shoot in New Zealand, the last thing Naomi Watts really wanted to do was venture into the depths of rural China for another movie.
But after four years of planning and delays, the petite blonde was determined to see The Painted Veil through to fruition.
The film is based on the 1925 novel by W. Somerset Maugham. Watts isn't the first actress in the role - Greta Garbo starred in a 1934 version and a second adaptation, Seventh Sin with Eleanor Parker, was released in 1957 .
It was just as well she agreed to the role, for it was on the shoot that she met co-star and now partner Liev Schreiber, with whom she had their now nine-month-old son Alexander.
The film, shot two years ago, was first released in America in late 2006 but, though well-reviewed, it has only just made it to Australian and New Zealand cinemas.
"I don't know why it took so long to come here," says Watts. "It does feel funny to still be talking about it. But it is a film that is very dear to my heart and did affect my life in quite major ways."
Shot on location in China, the project was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, says Watts.
"It was such a life adventure being in China and shooting in these very remote places that neither you or I would probably ever get to go if it wasn't for the film. Even the most courageous of travellers do not end up in the places we ended up."
It was not an adventure Watts was prepared for, having just completed the final scenes of King Kong in New Zealand.
"It was a really physical endeavour. I think I've said it to everyone but I think [King Kong] might be my last action film because I was quite beaten up by it. I loved every second of it of course but it was hard. I think it would have been hard on an athlete, rather than a wee slip of a thing like myself."
Though she was passionate about The Painted Veil, Watts was desperate to take a break from film work. As producer on the film, alongside co-star Edward Norton, Watts pleaded to stall the production.
"I wanted to delay it. I'd been attached to it for about four years and Edward even longer, so come the time when they said they were ready, I was like, 'Oh shoot, can we delay it for another couple of months?"'
But the film team was ready for action, so Watts sucked it up and headed to China to play Kitty, a selfish and shallow London socialite.
"Ultimately, the fact that I was drained and bored by everything and wanting my own life back, I think added to Kitty's ambivalence," Watts explains.
The film begins in 1920s London, where Kitty meets and marries Dr Walter Fane (Norton), who she neither loves nor particularly likes. The couple move to Shanghai, where Kitty begins an affair with a diplomat (Schreiber) before a bitter Walter drags her into the hinterland where he has to deal with a cholera epidemic.
Filming required more than four moves around the country and producers enlisted the help of the Chinese Film Bureau to scout locations and access remote regions. The result is a rare insight into China's landscape and beauty.
But working with the officials presented problems for the crew as they struggled to toe the line.
"Of course they wanted their country reflected in the best possible manner. We honoured that as much as we could in order to get to those locations. But it meant we had to please them as well, which can be a creative conflict."
Fortunately, both parties worked through the issues and were pleased with the result, says Watts.
"I am really proud of this film. It's amazing how many times people stop me and say they saw it and they really, really got swept up in the romance of it all. I think it really affected people."
The slow-paced, old-world romance was certainly a change of tempo from King Kong.
So was Watts' next project, psychological thriller Funny Games, by Austrian director Michael Haneke. Watts has a history of genre-switching, going from the surreal Mulholland Drive to the remake of Japanese horror The Ring, and from the gritty drama 21 Grams to the romantic comedy Le Divorce. Though Watts agrees there is a trend, she says it is not a calculated move on her part.
"There are two things that drive me. The first thing is the part and the script. It has to drive some kind of truth home to me. There has to be something I can connect with that has meaning for me personally.
"It's also director-driven. If I love the director I'll run towards it."
It was the director that drew Watts to the controversial Funny Games, which examines the use of on-screen violence, making viewers feel guilty for watching the graphically violent film.
"[It] was not an easy decision for me but based on Michael Haneke's work, it was something I felt I had to do. Having said that, I also believe in what he's doing, albeit very controversial and very much a difficult subject," she explains.
The film, a scene-for-scene remake of Haneke's 1997 German original, was Watts' last project before discovering she was pregnant, a life change that has seen the actress cut down on acting work and reassess what roles she takes.
Since the birth of her son, Alexander Peter Schreiber, in July last year, Watts has worked on just one film, The International, filmed in Berlin last October.
"I made the decision to do that before I had the baby, when I was pregnant. In retrospect, now knowing what it is, it probably wasn't the wisest decision. When you're in your second trimester you feel like you can take on the world," she laughs.
"I haven't worked since, by choice, because it's just such a great, valuable time to spend with him. I haven't got anything set in stone.
"I'm certainly not saying I don't want to work but nothing's been great enough to take time away from him thus far. We'll see what happens, if anything, before the end of the year."
Next year, however, she's reprising Tippi Hedren's role in a remake of Hitchcock classic The Birds, directed by New Zealander Martin Campbell - not only is it yet another remake but one in which she is once more harassed by mother nature while being shouted at by a Kiwi.
