The 'Vicky Cristina Barcelona' star expresses his disagreement with the 'public lynching' of the controversial filmmaker when attending the Lumiere Festival in Lyon, France.

• Oct 18, 2018

AceShowbiz - Javier Bardem would jump at the chance to work with Woody Allen again, insisting he is troubled by the "public lynching" of the filmmaker over sexual assault allegations.

The "Blue Jasmine" filmmaker's ex-girlfriend, actress Mia Farrow, famously broke off their romance in 1992 and accused the actor/director of molesting her adopted daughter, Dylan, then seven.

Investigations were launched at the time by child welfare officials in New York and prosecutors in Connecticut, but Allen was not charged with a crime and has always maintained his innocence.

Bardem and Allen worked together in 2008 on "Vicky Cristina Barcelona" and he insists he would not have any issues reuniting with the director despite the controversy surrounding him.

"At the time I did 'Vicky Cristina Barcelona', the allegations were already well known for more than 10 years, and two states in the U.S. deemed he was not guilty," he said at the Lumiere Festival in Lyon, France on Tuesday, October 16. "If the legal situation ever changes, then I'd change my mind. But for now I don't agree with the public lynching that he's been receiving, and if Woody Allen called me to work with him again I'd be there tomorrow morning. He's a genius."

This isn't the first time the actor has spoken out in defence of Woody - earlier this year, Bardem expressed shock at the judgments Allen was facing from actors including Mira Sorvino and Timothee Chalamet, who vowed to never work with the director again.

"If there was evidence that Woody Allen was guilty, then yes, I would have stopped working with him, but I have doubts," he told Paris Match magazine in April. "I am very shocked by this sudden treatment (of Allen)..."