Salma Hayek’s Close, ‘Enriching’ Friendship With Angelina Jolie

Salma Hayek and Angelina Jolie have been friends for years. For Hayek, 57, their close bond has been "enriching" and growing even deeper. In a new interview with ET this week, Hayek opened up about what she loves most about her friendship with Jolie, 48: "Everything," Hayek gushed. "She's been very, very enriching in my life, in so many ways -- as mothers, you know. Most of all, as artists."

According to Hayek, who starred opposite Jolie in the 2021 Marvel film The Eternals, their friendship is one "that keeps growing." That isn't the only time the stars worked with each other on a film. Jolie directed the upcoming film, Without Blood, which will star Hayek. Hayek told Deadline last year of the experience that Jolie "is the best director I’ve ever worked with... I absolutely loved working with her; enjoyed every second of it." Hayek told ET in Wednesday's (Sept.13) interview that as the years pass and they spend more and more time together, she and Jolie grow "closer and closer. And it's just natural. It's just something that flows."

Without Blood is based on the 2002 Alessandro Baricco novel of the same name. Jolie’s fifth-directed film follows a girl named Nina during wartime and “explores universal truths about war, trauma, memory, and healing,” according to the film’s production company, Fremantle. In a farmhouse deep in the Italian countryside, a horrifying act of violence occurs, with Nina (played by Hayek) being the family's sole survivor. Fast forward to Nina in her fifties, she meets her childhood savior, Tito (Demián Bichir), and revisits the events of that fateful night through a series of flashbacks.

“The book had an impact on me as it has so many other people,” Jolie told People last August. “It carries themes and questions important to discuss.” This isn't the first time Jolie has directed a wartime story. Back in 2014, she directed Unbroken, set during World War II.