Kate Winslet makes directorial debut with Goodbye June

Kate Winslet has made her directorial debut with a Christmas film written by her son, Joe Anders.

"I think it just feels great to have directed my first film in the 50th year of my life as a woman. It feels good, it feels good," the Titanic star told Deadline.

Winslet revealed to the outlet that the thought of the Goodbye June screenplay, written by her son Joe Anders, being shot by another filmmaker made her feel "like I'd been stabbed in the gut".

The Oscar-winning is no stranger to the directing world, having worked closely with giants of cinema, including James Cameron on Titanic and Avatar; Sam Mendes, her ex-husband - and father of Anders - on Revolutionary Road; Francis Lee on Ammonite, and Todd Haynes on Mildred Pierce.

She was already set to produce and play a role in Goodbye June, a film that her son had begun writing aged 19 while on a screenwriting course, but the idea that she would helm it hadn't been broached until they were in the thick of the development process together.

"Christ knows," the Oscar-winning star told the outlet, "I've been on enough film sets to know what works and what doesn't. I think that's something that I know that I can say, and I've been around enough actors to, I think, have some degree of instinct about what's helpful and what's not.

"I've been part of that community for a very, very long time."

Goodbye June will be in cinemas in December.