For the film’s climactic chase involving three Mini-Coopers weaving through Los Angeles traffic, Theron and co-star MARK WAHLBERG practised hairpin turns and 180-degree spins on a racetrack.

“Everyone said, ‘She’s a girl, she’ll need more driving-school time’, and I was like, ‘I’m gonna show you all!’,” Theron told the New York Daily News.

“I grew up on a farm in South Africa so I’ve been driving since I was really young. I don’t get freaked out easily.”

Theron says she found fast driving so addictive that she was given two speeding tickets during three weeks of filming.

“When you’re driving fast for six hours a day and somebody’s saying to you, ‘Push it faster, faster!’ and then you get into your own car, you find yourself going down side streets at 80 miles an hour,” she said.