Salma Hayek Pinault didn’t know if she was meant to star in Without Blood — but director Angelina Jolie did.

Speaking to Entertainment Weekly at the Toronto International Film Festival, Hayek admitted that she wasn’t initially keen on the role of Nina, a woman who endures both the brutality of war and toil of searching for healing in its aftermath.

“I didn’t want to do the movie. I didn’t want to be Nina,” Pinault said. “I didn’t want to go to the places that she’s been, emotionally. So I told Angie, I don't want to do this woman. I don't want to. It's too painful. It's taken so many years for me to get to a place in my life where I'm really happy. I don't want to go suffer for weeks and weeks.”

The way Hayek saw it, the film — based on Alessandro Baricco's novel of the same name — is a "very complicated piece for an actor." It follows a woman embroiled in a years-long plot of subtle revenge for her family's horrific murder.

“You have to be on the edge of complete breakdown for the entire movie, and never breakdown,” Hayek explained. “You have to be at the edge every single day, every single hour of the day while you're playing this character. And there's nowhere to hide. There's not a lot of action happening. If for one second you are not there, it is going to be very clear.”

Getty(2)

All of that said, Hayek eventually came around, in large part because of Jolie’s efforts.

“Somehow she convinced me,” she told EW, adding that it took “a lot of long conversations” before she agreed to the emotionally demanding role. So what exactly made Hayek change her mind? Processing what made her hesitate in the first place.

“I realized that even though this character is in very different circumstance, I was afraid to relieve personal trauma that is completely different,” Hayek said. “I think all of us women can identify some of our trauma to it. Being tossed aside. Men always making the important decisions in your life and having sometimes no choice but to go along with it. Being paralyzed by having your power taken away from a really young age. Having trauma and not knowing how to come out of it… And then finding the strength out of hate and anger.”

She added, “So I understood the importance of this character beyond the circumstances of the movie.”

Want more movie news? Sign up for Entertainment Weekly's free newsletter to get the latest trailers, celebrity interviews, film reviews, and more.

As for Jolie’s role as a director, Hayek showered her in high praise.

“This is the best actors director I've ever worked with,” she admitted, and did not state it lightly. “I've never felt so valued. She knew I was the right actress. I didn't even know I was the right actress at the moment.”

She added that this was a rare situation, where she knew that “I could call my director at three in the morning in absolute despair” because “if [it] meant she came over there in the middle of the night and held me, that's what she would do.”

Without Blood marks Jolie’s sixth directorial effort, after A Place in Time, In the Land of Blood and Honey, Unbroken, By the Sea, and First They Killed My Father.