Kate Winslet in Black Image

Description: Hideous Kinky, a low-budget hippie romance shot prior to the release of Titanic, was Kate Winslet's first and only film of 1998. Based on a novel, Winslet rejected offers to play the leading roles in Shakespeare in Love (1998) and Anna and the King (1999) in favor of the role of a young English mother named Julia who moves with her daughters... ( +expand to view full text )

Description: Hideous Kinky, a low-budget hippie romance shot prior to the release of Titanic, was Kate Winslet's first and only film of 1998. Based on a novel, Winslet rejected offers to play the leading roles in Shakespeare in Love (1998) and Anna and the King (1999) in favor of the role of a young English mother named Julia who moves with her daughters from London to Morocco in hopes to start a new life The film garnered generally mixed reviews and received limited release only, resulting in a worldwide gross of $5 million. Despite the success of Titanic, the next film Winslet opted to star in was Holy Smoke! (1999) featuring Harvey Keitel, another low-budget project ¡ª much to the misery of her agents, who felt "miserable" about her preference of arthouse movies. Feeling pressured, Winslet has said she "never saw Titanic as a springboard for bigger films or bigger pay cheques," knowing that "it could have been that, but would have destroyed ." The same year, she voiced Brigid in the computer animated film Faeries.