Milla Jovovich talks babysitting for Fifth Element co-star Bruce Willis’ family on set of the 1997 film: ‘I was more friends with his kids’

Milla Jovovich reminisced about the “special moments” she had starring alongside Bruce Willis in The Fifth Element ahead of its 27th anniversary.

The 48-year-old actress – who strongly believes ‘Beauty is meaningless if you don’t know who you are’ – opened up about her almost 30-year acting career PEOPLE“I can’t believe I’m at that point, so many anniversaries!”

The Breathe star says she remembers everything about her past setbacks: “There are always, in our lives, some brilliant moments among all the details – among all the normal things, among all the failures and disappointments. and everything else, the good, the bad, the normal, the ugly.”

She said being Willis’, 69, co-star “should be one of those shining moments in my life, in my career as something that really mattered to me as a person and as an actress.”

‘It was a special moment. It was a special character,” she said.

The actress went on to say that she spent quite a bit of time connecting with Willis’ children while they were shooting the film in 1996.

Because he was ‘a lot older than me, I was more friends with his children, and’ [his then-wife] Demi Moore, they were coming to visit.”

In turn, she practically babysat Willis and Moore’s three daughters, Rumer, Scout and Tallulah.

“We listened to music and danced together,” Milla recalled, “and gave the parents ‘some mommy-daddy time.’

“I was like an older sister,” she said, calling the actor’s clan “a special family.”

The movie star was especially enthusiastic about the actor’s daughters, saying that she was closest to them.

“They’re so cool, and such great girls, they have such a great relationship with Demi, and I love that,” she said.

“I consider them a family unit, and I really love what they created,” Jovovich said, noting they still kept in touch.

Chris Tucker — who famously played Ruby Rhode in the 1997 film — told the outlet that he had “great, great times” with Willis and Jovovich while on set.

“Of course I’ll keep him in my prayers,” the 52-year-old actor said of Willis’ recent health battle that led to his acting retirement.

Willis was diagnosed with aphasia in 2022 and later frontotemporal dementia.

‘It was always great to see him. I will never forget it. It was a great time working with him,” he concludes.

Willis’ longtime friend and director M. Night Shyamalan recently spoke PEOPLE about how the actor’s family is dealing with his diagnosis.

Shyamalan, 53, shot to fame in 1999 with his breakthrough film The Sixth Sense, starring Willis, and a year later they would work together in 2000’s Unbreakable.

More recently, Willis had a brief cameo in the post-credits scene as David Dunn from 2016’s Unbreakable in Split, before reprising that role in 2019’s Glass.

“He has a very loving family. They are doing the best they can,” Shyamalan said at a recent press event to promote his new film Trap, in theaters on August 9.

The director was referring to Willis’ wife of 15 years, Emma Hemming Willis, their daughters Mabel and Evelyn, and Bruce’s children with Demi Moore.

Willis was already a household name when he signed on to play Malcolm Crowe in Shyamalan’s The Sixth Sense, which took the director’s career to new heights.

The film – with its now iconic twist ending – was a box office hit, raking in $293.4 million domestically and $672.8 million worldwide on a budget of just $40 million.

Shyamalan and Willis’ second collaboration, 2000’s Unbreakable, was also a hit, raking in $95 million domestically and $248.1 million worldwide from a $75 million budget.

Sixteen years later, fans were stunned when Willis returned in late 2016 in a post-credits cameo in Split, tying that film into the events of Unbreakable.

Willis returned as Dunn alongside Samuel L. Jackson’s Elijah Price, aka Mr. Jackson. Glass, and James McAvoy as Kevin Wendell Crumb, aka The Beast in 2019’s Glass.

Split ended up earning $278.5 million worldwide on a budget of just $9 million, while Glass earned $247 million worldwide on a budget of $20 million.