The cast was in Austin, Texas, this month for the film's premiere at South by Southwest festival, where it was filmed. And Gosling was excited to finally see the finished film. "We made it maybe four years ago now or something," he says, "and so many things happened, it was such a unique process. But it's a Terrence Malick film!"

Ryan Gosling and Rooney Mara in Song To Song

Malick is notorious for his filmmaking style, in which he shoots a wide range of scenes and then crafts the narrative in the editing room. "My character went through so many different incarnations," Gosling says. "And that's kind of the interesting thing about the way Terrence Malick works. He's sort of finding it as he goes along."

He says that the entire cast was happy to just go with it. "We all wanted to have this experience of working with Terrence Malick," Gosling says. "He's one of the few filmmakers who you could watch a few seconds of his movie and you know he made it. That's very rare, and working with him is a completely different way of working. He's always looking for something and you're happy to help him if you can! Every day was different, and it was a completely unique experience. All you can do is leave everything you thought you new behind and just go on this journey."

On the other hand, Gosling is happy to avoid the other side of stardom when he can. His partner Eva Green skipped last month's Oscars, preferring to stay home with their two young daughters. And Gosling wishes he could have more privacy. "Well, you know, in the age of the Internet, there's no mystery anymore," he laughs. "There's no secrets. The comments section of anything, that's the new bathroom wall! It's hard for me to wrap my head around a lot of it. I prefer just to kind of stay out of it."

When asked why he has this image as the perfect boyfriend, he laughs and chalks it down to his "Canadianness". And he continues the joke: "I think it's part of America just finally realising that there's a place called Canada. That it's nearby. And the people there are, you know, different but the same. And not just America's hat. We have free health care, education."

Watch the trailer for Song To Song: