Penelope Cruz had to use muscles she hadn’t used since she was a teenager in new movie Nine.

The Spanish actress put in weeks of training for one particular scene in the musical movie - about a film director struggling in his relationships with women, in which Penelope plays the central character’s mistress - where she had to slide down a rope.

Describing the scene, Penelope said, “They mapped it out and showed me how it was done. I said I would never be able to do it but I worked and worked and regained the memory of muscles in my legs I hadn’t used since I was a teenager studying ballet.”

Penelope, 35, was rehearsing for the film’s rope scenes for three months before they were eventually completed, and was left with calluses on her hands and bleeding digits from sliding down the ropes so often.

She added to Britain’s Daily Mail, “I was stretching, running and going to the gym to get my arms strong to support me on the ropes. But with my hands, after a while you don’t feel the pain. I had the wounds dressed and carried on.”