CANNES -- Benjamin Bratt, long past his relationship with Julia Roberts and therefore no longer part of the Hollywood gossip machine, says he has never had it better than now.

"My entire world has become a paradise in the past two years," the sophisticated actor told The Sun at the Cannes Film Festival, where Bratt is appearing in a support role to Kevin Bacon in The Woodsman, a drama about a sexual predator.

"I have married the most incredible woman (actress Talisa Soto, his co-star in the underground film Pinero in 2001) who has given me a beautiful and strong-spirited daughter, Sofia," Bratt said. "And, for me, that's everything. It supersedes everything in my life."

Bratt said he still resents that the media took over too much of his life during the years 1997 to 2001, referring to his Roberts era without specifically mentioning Julia's name.

"I feel very strongly that we are smack in the middle of the too-much information age. There is just too much access, too much information that is needed, really.

"At the end of the day, I think we all have an inherent right to the same level of privacy as anyone else. It doesn't matter what you do."

But it is pointless to worry about it, Bratt said. "The best defence against the bullshit is to ignore it because, at the end of the day, it's old news. It really is. Whatever is written about you in print, whatever photos of you appear, it's on the bottom of a birdcage tomorrow."


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