Jessica Chastain began watching horror films when she was just seven years old.
The ‘IT: Chapter 2’ actress admitted her mum wasn’t "super responsible" when she was a child so she got to see some movies that weren’t suitable for her age, even though she was afraid.
She said: "I watched ‘The Exorcist’ with my mum when I was super young.
"My mum had me very young so she wasn’t always super responsible.
"I was probably seven or eight.
"I remember sitting downstairs in the living room and asking my mum, ‘Can we turn it off?’ She was like, ‘No no no, just go upstairs to your room if you don’t want to watch it.’
"But on her bed in her room is where she got possessed! I would sit with my mum and have a blanket over my head.
"My mum is going to kill me for saying that."
But the 42-year-old star – who welcomed a daughter via a surrogate last year with husband Gian Luca Passi de Preposulo – won’t let her own offspring have the same relaxed rules.
She told Britain’s OK! magazine: "No way. I would never do that. Listen, I think I turned out OK and I do love horror films, but I wonder if that is because I watched them at a very young age.
"However, I also used to have really bad nightmares as a kid, so I wouldn’t have a kid watch this movie."
Jessica has been very busy with work in recent months and is looking forward to eventually enjoying a "perfect" weekend at home.
She said: "Right now, a weekend off is pretty scarce.
"I’m making a female spy movie in London so I’ve been flying back and forth between the UK and USA.
"I won’t have a weekend off until October at the earliest.
"But I live in the country, so I’d spend the perfect weekend there. I like gardening and going to the farmers’ market. I love cooking. I love doing all these things that connect me to the earth."