It has been a while since audiences got to watch Kate Winslet on the big screen. The actress narrated the Amazon Prime Video documentary Eating Our Way To Extinction last year, but she hasn’t starred in a live action dramatic role on film since playing Mary Anning in Ammonite back in 2020.

Winslet will be back in December this year, however, as part of the cast of James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water. She is one of a number of actors who will appear in the franchise for the first time, having not been in the original film in 2009. Cliff Curtis, Edie Falco, Michelle Yeoh and Fast & Furious’ Vin Diesel are all joining the world of Avatar.

Winslet’s 31-year-long career speaks for itself, and her place in Hollywood folklore is already guaranteed, even if she never appeared in another movie again. Among the biggest roles of her career, the one that she is arguably most known for is in Titanic, which was also directed by Cameron.

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Another memorable Winslet performance was in the romantic sci-fi drama Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The actress believes that this film forever changed the trajectory of her career.

What Role Did Kate Winslet Play In Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind?

The official synopsis for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind on the Apple TV website reads: “After a painful breakup, Clementine undergoes a procedure to erase memories of her former boyfriend Joel from her mind.”

“When Joel discovers that Clementine is going to extremes to forget their relationship, he undergoes the same procedure and slowly begins to forget the woman that he loved. Directed by former music video director Michel Gondry, the visually arresting film explores the intricacy of relationships and the pain of loss.”

Kate Winslet featured in the role of Clementine Kruczynski, with Jim Carrey starring as her former boyfriend, Joel Barish. The duo were joined in the cast by Kirsten Dunst, who played a receptionist for Lacuna Inc. by the name Mary Svevo. Lacuna was the company behind the memory-erasing procedures.

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Mark Ruffalo, Elijah Wood, Tom Wilkinson and Ellen Pompeo were all part of the rest of the cast. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind was written by Charlie Kaufman.

Kate Winslet Landed The Role In Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind By Criticizing The Script

Kate Winslet once said that her performance in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind was the best of her entire career. She did not entirely see that potential, though, when she first laid her eyes on the script.

In fact, out of all the actors who auditioned for the part of Clementine, she was the only one who criticized Charlie Kaufman’s writing. Everyone else is said to have been overly positive with their feedback, according to Michel Gondry.

“[Kate] got the part because I’d interviewed all the most famous actresses of the time – because Charlie Kaufman’s script was very good – and she was the only one to give any negative comments on it. Basically, she was the only one not licking my ---,” Gondry said in an interview with The Daily Beast on the 10th anniversary of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

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Gondry went ahead to explain the elements that didn’t sit well with Winslet in the script, saying: “She said that it was a little bit repetitive in some places, and we shouldn’t shy away from being more sentimental.”

How Did Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind Change Kate Winslet’s Career?

Before she played Clementine in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Kate Winslet had developed a knack for being typecast in period films, most of them from her native Britain. One of the earliest roles of her career was in Sense and Sensibility, based on the similarly-titled Jane Austen novel of 1811.

In the years that followed, Winslet would go on to feature in more films of the same genre, including A Kid in King Arthur's Court, Jude, Hamlet, Hideous Kinky and Quills. The actress recalled this pattern in an interview with Variety last year, where she also spoke about breaking that cycle with the Michel Gondry film.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind was the biggest turning point for me because that was when people stopped seeing me as the ‘English rose in a corset’ from an industry perspective. People saw that I was capable of other dimensions,” said Winslet.

Now James Cameron has enlisted her for his latest project, and the 47-year-old continues to break the boundaries – especially for female actors in Hollywood.