It has all the ingredients of a classic Hollywood weepie; a glamourous movie star, an exotic location and a love affair sparked by an attraction as intense as it was instant. When Kate Winslet first set eyes on Jamie Threapleton, the 25-year-old film director who now shares her life, she knew that theirs was no ordinary encounter. Even now, two years later, the memory of that first meeting is still fresh in Kate's mind, as she talks with candid warmth of the man who won her heart. "The minute I saw this person, I just thought, 'Oh God I know what's going to happen'," she says, sporting the cropped haircut that has added a new dimension to her appearance.

"I don't know what it was. It's really, really strange. I've had people tell me time and time again that when you know, you know. But I always thought, 'How can you ever know anything at first sight?'. But it really was. It wasn't that I knew it was going to be for ever the minute I saw him - I just definitely knew that something very, very big was going to happen. And now we're married and I love it." The pair wed last November in a ceremony that bore all the hallmarks of 23-year-old Kate's down-to-earth approach to her success. The service took place in her parents' local church, while guests were treated to a bangers-and-mash reception at a nearby pub. This at a time when Winslet was the toast of Hollywood, a woman whose Oscar-nominated performance in Titanic had set new records for film hype.

But Kate has always had a peculiar relationship with her career. For all the adulation, she has never stood easily in the role of screen star. When ex-boyfriend Stephen Tredre died, Kate attended his London funeral rather than the LA premiere of Titanic. "Professional heresy," said some. "Life is not about success and status," replied Kate. Such a headstrong sense of personal priority may explain Kate's involvement in Hideous Kinky, the low-budget adaptation of Esther Freud's novel which marked her return to the screen after Titanic. The film, released in Britain two months ago, was not a raging hit but that was never the point. It provided Kate with the time and freedom to reacquaint herself with reality.

"I just wanted to ground myself again after Titanic because it was so big and so exhausting," she says. "It was fun as well but it was the whole 'epic' thing that was tiring.

"I think that, after Titanic, I just wanted to do something that was completely different. I was looking for something that was smaller and British because I didn't want people to think, 'Oh, Kate Winslet, now that she's made it she's just going to go to Hollywood and make millions and millions of dollars'. Then Hideous Kinky came along and I thought, 'Yeah, that's the one'." ALTHOUGH it was the script that first raised her interest, so did the prospect of a decent suntan. "For five years before doing Hideous Kinky, I wasn't allowed to get a tan. I was always in sunblock to stay English rose-like. For this one it was, 'Kate! You're not on set, get in the sun'. I had to have a tan for the part so it was fun for me to do that."

The filming took place in Morocco and it was there, at the end of 1997, that she first met Threapleton, third assistant director on the project. After her intense relationship with Tredre, who was diagnosed with cancer shortly after the pair split up, Kate had not been looking for a relationship, least of all on location. She explains: "You don't go to work to find romantic things, you go to work to do work things." But the attraction proved too strong. "It was pretty instant," she says.

Jamie, too, had a premonition that theirs was going to be a lasting romance. As Kate explains: "One thing he did say is that as I was driving the car up to him, he actually turned away because he had this feeling that something was going to happen." Since their wedding, the pair have spent as much time as possible together at their North London home, though rumours that Kate is pregnant have so far proved illfounded. "We're not planning it yet," she says when pushed. "We're too young - we want more time just to do things together first."

As and when that changes, she says she would have no qualms about hiring a nanny to look after the children. "My mother is a qualified nanny and, when I grew up, there were lots of children running round the house and she was wonderful. I wouldn't want a permanent live-in situation but you just have to see when the time comes." In the meantime, Kate is working with Harvey Keitel on her latest film, Holy Smoke, directed by Jane Campion of The Piano fame. It is the story of a girl who becomes mixed up with a religious cult. "What is it about me and spiritual quests?" asks Kate, before admitting that the part was too good a chance to turn down. "You get offered a Campion film and you don't say No."

But how does she choose from the hundreds of offers that have come her way since Titanic? "It's always whether the script is strong and whether the character grabs me. It would have to be a challenge for me as well. I'd never do something that I thought I could do standing on my head. It would have to stretch me as an actor because I'm only 23 and I have a lot to learn about acting."

CLEAR evidence, then, that Kate takes her craft very seriously. And even now, with 10 feature films under her belt, she insists on taking at least six weeks to prepare for each new part, "Reading and writing and doing all the mad things that actors do".

"I never want to find myself working on a movie and thinking about the next film that I've got to do. I just don't think it's fair to myself or the people I'm working with. At the end of the day, it's a job and it's a hard job. Believe me, there are mornings when you wake up and you think, 'I really don't want to do this today'.

"In that sense, it's just the same as any other job. It's just that it's film-making and film-making can make people into movie stars. "But I don't think of myself as a movie star. I think of myself as Kate. I try to lead as normal a life as I possibly can - and for the most part I think I succeed."