Kristin Scott Thomas has an onscreen family bond with Scarlett Johansson.

Back in 1998, when Johansson was just 13 years old, the pair played a mother-daughter duo in Robert Redford's acclaimed drama The Horse Whisperer. Now, 27 years later, the Marvel star is back playing Scott Thomas' onscreen daughter for a second time in My Mother's Wedding.

The film marks the directorial debut from The English Patient Oscar nominee. As she tells PEOPLE, Johansson was her top pick for the role of a Royal Navy captain who reunites with her two sisters (played by Sienna Miller and Emily Beecham) for the third wedding of their twice widowed mother (Scott Thomas).

"She's an extraordinary actress," Scott Thomas, 65, says of Johansson, 40. "I was very, very happy to find her again."

The two hadn't kept in touch over the years, Scott Thomas says, save for bumping into each other "from time to time."

"It's very easy to lose touch when you are a film actor because you go from one project to the next," she explains. "You swear to a never-ending friendship and then gradually something else distracts you."