Jessica Chastain: 'I studied Raphael's Madonna for The Tree of Life'

Jessica Chastain has revealed that studying Raphael's Madonna helped her prepare to star in Terrence Malick's Tree of Life.

Chastain told Interview magazine Malick advised her that going to the Metropolitan Museum of Art would give her a better understanding of the 1950s housewife she plays in the film.

"There was one picture in particular: Raphael's Madonna," the actress recalled. "I would go into the Metropolitan Museum of Art and just sit for hours looking at the portraits of the Madonna, because I found that there's a completely different energy when you look at a painting of the Madonna and you look at a painting of any other woman, even from that time period."

Chastain continued: "There's something in her eyes and in her hands. There's never a direct gaze. Usually her eyes are kind of downcast, and her fingers seem like they're reaching up towards the heavens, even if they're at her heart. I found that was very helpful."

The star went on to say that now she cannot help but notice the Madonna's influence when watching Tree of Life.

"Now when I watch the film, I see that in one of the very first shots of me, I'm sitting at the kitchen table and looking down to the right, and when I pause it, it looks like Raphael's Madonna," Chastain said. "It's like, 'Terrence Malick! You knew!'"

Chastain earned awards from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association and the New York Film Critics Circle for her performance in Tree of Life, which was released earlier this year.

She also received a Screen Actors Guild nomination this week for The Help.

Chastain will next co-star with Shia LaBeouf and Tom Hardy in the drama The Wettest County, which opens on April 20, 2012 in the US and May 4 in the UK.

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Watch Jessica Chastain in the Tree of Life trailer below: