‘Avatar: The Way of Water’ Star Kate Winslet Revisits the ‘Titanic’ Door Debate
Avatar: The Way of Water is Kate Winslet‘s second movie with James Cameron. And when talking about her experiences with the director, she revisited the highly-debated door scene from their 1997 hit Titanic.
Kate Winslet vowed to never work with James Cameron after ‘Titanic’
Cameron’s Titanic made Winslet and her co-star Leonardo DiCaprio Hollywood A-listers overnight. The film was a critical and commercial success, grossing over $2 billion worldwide and earning dozens of accolades, including 11 Academy Awards. Winslet also received Oscar, Golden Globe, and Screen Actors Guild nominations for her performance.
But despite the film’s immense success and the impact it had on her career, Winslet wasn’t entirely happy with her filming experience. And she once vowed to never work with Cameron again.
“He has a temper like you wouldn’t believe,” she said via The Guardian in 1999. “You’d have to pay me a lot of money to work with Jim again.”
Cut to 2017 — Winslet was back on Cameron’s set for Avatar: The Way of Water. And when asked about how she got over her reluctance to work with the filmmaker, she pointed out how much they’ve changed and grown over the years.
“I think we’re just older, wiser, different people,” Winslet said in a recent interview with Yahoo UK. “Creatively, hopefully, I’ve gone away and learned a lot of things and he has, for sure, evolved enormously as a director and as a person.”
“He’s driven and determined the way he always was but, my god, he’s just such a genius,” the Mare of Easttown star continued. “He’s the only one who ultimately knows what needs to happen in order to achieve his vision. And he’s always right.”
Kate Winslet revisits the ‘Titanic’ door debate
Audiences fell in love with Titanic when it was released in 1997, and many still enjoy it today. But there’s one scene in the film that continues to perplex fans.
In one of the movie’s final moments, Winslet’s Rose finds safety on a floating door as the Titanic sinks. For some reason, DiCaprio’s hero, Jack, decides not to get on the door with Rose and freezes to death in the icy cold water.
For years, fans wondered why Jack didn’t get on the door with Rose — a move that would have saved his life and given the film a happier ending. And Winslet thinks it’s funny how far people have gone to figure it out.
“It’s funny, the door seems to have had a resurgence over the last few years. I don’t know why,” Winslet told Yahoo UK. “People seem to be doing all kinds of experiments as to whether or not they could’ve really fit on the door. It’s hilarious.”
Noting it’s a mystery that remains to be solved, she added, “It’s one of those unanswerable questions. We’ll have to just go back there again and see if we could really both get on that door eventually.”
Kate Winslet is back in the water for ‘Avatar: The Way of Water’
Cameron gave Winslet a door to float on in Titanic. But for Avatar: The Way of Water, he asked her to walk underwater.
The filmmaker built a 900,000-gallon tank on set that mimics the ocean’s waves and swirls. And utilizing his new underwater performance capture technology, he filmed the actors underwater and then layered it with digital imagery in post.
Winslet — who plays Ronal, a member of the Metkayina sea tribe — held her breath underwater for several minutes at a time while filming. And she admitted she was “surprised at how well” she could do it.
“I knew going into it that it was something I was going to be really at ease with,” Winslet recalled to Yahoo UK. “And I knew there was the potential that I could maybe get quite good at it just because I was never afraid.”
“I was able to relax myself enough to be able to hold my breath for quite long periods of time sort of from the outset,” she added. “But when I did that big breath-hold, I couldn’t believe it. I was very proud of myself and I was amazed that I did that.”
Avatar: The Way of Water is playing in theaters worldwide.
