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It's true that French are not very sophisticated in the sense that they don't dress up for dinners. They are not like Americans, where they are always perfect - the girls are not very sporty; they don't take care of themselves as much as Americans, who always have very white teeth and are so fit.

When I was in the U.S. for 'Swimming Pool,' people had asked me, 'So are you going to settle down in Hollywood?' And I said, 'No, I'm French! I am living in France. I am not going to be American.'

The American women are very pretty and have great simplicity of character, and the extreme neatness of their appearance is truly delightful: cleanliness is everywhere even more studiously attended to here than in England.

The great thing about American women is their energy and the way they love to dress. French women don't really dress; they are too conservative, as it's always a question of money. In America, women are powerful and strong, determined. If they want to be an object, they choose to be in control.

There is a painful joke that Europeans often tell of their Gallic neighbors: God created France, the most beautiful country in the world with so much good in it, and ended up feeling guilty about it. He had to do something to make it fair. And so, he created the French people.

No one could touch the home cooking of an Italian woman. French women, they are very intelligent, very sexy - but they don't like to cook.

I know a lot of Americans in Paris who have married Frenchmen. They keep bringing up their experience, the clash of civilizations, the clash of personalities.

I like Frenchmen very much, because even when they insult you they do it so nicely.

I hope this doesn't sound pretentious, but I very often like the way Europeans make movies. I think sometimes that don't they care about having to clean certain things.

I am not a great French woman. George Sand, Marguerite Duras and Simone de Beauvoir are great French women.