Why Kate Winslet has actively avoided weighing herself for twelve years

'Top tip - it's a great move!'

Words by Jadie Troy-Pryde

Many Hollywood actresses have spoken up about the pressures of the film industry this week, with Brie Larson recently revealing she 'didn't feel pretty enough' to audition for leading roles, and Margot Robbie also admiting that she 'didn't feel hot enough' for her role in Wolf of Wall Street when she noticed the casting sheet referred to her character as 'the hottest blonde ever'.

But one A-lister who has spent a good part of her career discussing the disproportionate amount of attention given to women's beauty and bodies - especially in Hollywood - is Kate Winslet.

The 41-year-old Titanic star has empowered women with some of the best body confidence quotes we've ever heard from Tinseltown.

When it comes to being a role model for her daughter, she has said: 'As a child, I never heard one woman say to me, “I love my body”. Not my mother, my elder sister, my best friend. No one woman has ever said, “I am so proud of my body.” So I make sure to say it to Mia [her daughter], because a positive physical outlook has to start at an early age.'

So when she was discussing her upcoming film, The Mountain Between Us, Kate spoke about a scene where her co-star Idris Elba has to pull her out of a stream.

'It was very hard on him,' she said.

'I don’t know how much I weigh. I haven’t weighed myself in 12 years – top tip it is a great move!

'But pulling my body weight, plus soaking wet with water and those clothes – it was pretty rough on poor old Idris.'

Kate feels it's important to promote positive body image for women from a young age, as she admits she didn't get that support as a child.

'When I grew up, I never heard positive reinforcement about body image from any female in my life. I only heard negatives,' she has previously confessed.

'That’s very damaging because then you’re programmed as a young woman to immediately scrutinise yourself and how you look. I was chubby, always had big feet, the wrong shoes, bad hair.'