Angelina Jolie has joked that her six children think she's "weird".
The actress, who is mother to 14-year-old Maddox, 12-year-old Pax, 10-year-old Zahara, 9-year-old Shiloh and 7-year-old twins Knox and Vivienne, told The Guardian's Observer that while she could sometimes "be cool", her children liked to keep her on her toes.
"They think I'm weird," she said. "Maddox talks to me sometimes about writing as if he doesn't think I'm terrible at it… And Vivienne is just happy I'm a tiger in a panda movie. But, ah, she's just the little one – she's all sweet.
"There are moments when I can be cool, but they like to mess with me. They like to make fun of me. I'm just…Little Mommy."
Jolie, who starred opposite and directed husband Brad Pitt in emotional drama By the Sea, also spoke of her difficulty to live "in the every day".
"I've always been very… I'm a bit on fire, inside," she explained. "Sometimes I try to just sit at home and do something calmer and simpler and just be in my life. You know, not trying to solve a lot of things at once."
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Jolie also revealed how filming her on-screen reunion with Pitt had become very personal as she went through a cancer scare as the film closed.
The movie was partly inspired by her mother Marcheline Bertrand's death from ovarian cancer aged 56. Earlier this year, Jolie revealed she had opted to have her ovaries removed after a cancer scare.
This latest treatment brought the subject of the film even closer to home.
She said: "I was exploring my mother's pain – the theme of not understanding yourself, your body and mind being out of control, not feeling complete. And then my own pain."
She added: "I was in the editing room... That's when I got the call to say I might have cancer."
Despite the challenges of working opposite Pitt in a film based on a crumbling relationship, Jolie said she wanted to do the film with her husband to allow them to be "free" in their work.
"There are always so many projects separating us, and this was a nice thing for us to do that felt free – not part of us that's all the other things," she said.
By the Sea is released in cinemas on December 11.
