Maybe movie moguls should have asked those in the know before making a blockbuster about a legendary writer.

However, Sussex-based Virginia Nicholson, great-niece of Virginia Woolf, had to wait until she saw The Hours, which tracks a day in the tragic life of the literary star, before passing judgement.

And she isn't happy with the casting of Nicole Kidman as her great-aunt or the portrayal of the Sussex landscape.

The film's opening sequence, which recreates Woolf's last moments as she walks from her Rodmell home to the banks of the River Ouse to drown herself, is inaccurate, according to Virginia, who has written a book on the Bohemian set.

She said: "They show her putting stones in her pockets and arriving at the river - overhung by trees - with the sunlight glimmering through the branches. But she drowned herself in March, so there was no sunlight, no leaves, no overhanging branches. Maybe in terms of fiction this is okay but we are talking about real people."

Virginia was equally unimpressed with the choice of actresses in the film, which attracted Miranda Richardson and Julianne Moore.

Kidman was initially reluctant to take the part of Woolf, fearing she would not be up to the job of playing the icon.

Virginia agrees: "I think it was very odd casting. She is not the right age and has a different kind of beauty.

"I would have cast Meryl Streep. They cast Kidman because she is a star."

Virginia, wife of Oscar-nominated screenwriter William Nicholson, said Kidman failed to show Woolf's wacky side.

She said: "My father's memory was of her screaming with laughter. She was a hoot.

"Yes, she could be scathing but that impression comes from her private diaries and letters. Show me someone who isn't a bit rude in private."

Virginia recognised, however, it would be difficult not to criticise.

She said: "How can I possibly look at the film objectively? Whatever they do is going to be wrong."

The Hours is released on February 14.

Among The Bohemians: Experiments In Living 1900-1939, by Virginia Nicholson is published by Viking, priced £20.