Wimbledon

There's nothing like a Working Title rom-com to get the box office humming.

The people who brought us Four Weddings And A Funeral, Notting Hill and Bridget Jones's Diary are back with a tale of love and triumph set against the Wimbledon tennis championships.

Angelic Hollywood starlet Kirsten Dunst stars alongside Britain's own Paul Bettany in the film, part of which was filmed in Brighton.

Crowds flocked to see the stars filming at the Terraces cafe and along the seafront, with many local residents landing roles as extras.

The film sees Dunst's character Lizzie, a hard-nosed Grand Slam hopeful at her first ever Wimbledon, fall for Bettany's Peter Colt, a player who is slipping out of the top 100 and into obscurity.

Having always remained emotionally distant for the sake of her career, Lizzie's usual throw-away attitude to men is challenged when she is wooed by Peter, a move not encouraged by her strict coach and father, played by Sam Neill.

Love and success go head to head - and prove not to be mutually exclusive - as Peter is dealt a wild card and given the chance to compete in the championship for one last time. Embarking on an unexpected winning streak and spurred on by his relationship with Lizzie, he regains his confidence and wins back the hearts of the crowds.

Filmed on location at south-west London's prestigious tennis club with respected director Richard Locraine at the helm, the project has been in development for five years and has taken extensive research into the world of tennis to pull it off.

"Basically, it's almost like making two movies," says Locraine.

"Doing a romantic comedy, you think, 'Fine, the comedy comes out of reality, it springs from the truth. Good, I can film that, no problem.'

"Then, you've got a story involving tennis, which seems straightforward but is a really complex game to photograph -you haven't got a team of people, you've got two trained, almost ballet dancers who don't move much from beyond the base line."

Casting decisions came easily, with Dunst and Bettany both favoured from the start and production was forced to wait until the actors had completed previous commitments. Bettany himself had never played a romantic lead before, having previously appeared in A Beautiful Mind and the swash-buckling Master And Commander.

"I've never done a romantic comedy," says Bettany. "I was terribly flattered when someone phoned me up and asked me to audition for one."

The sporting element of the film required strict training regimes for the actors and 1987 Wimbledon champion Pat Cash was drafted in as an advisor.

"Obviously, since it's a movie, there is some artistic licence," reveals Cash.

"But it was pretty accurate with regard to the world of the players and the atmosphere at Wimbledon it portrays."

As with all Working Title productions, the promotional team have been working hard with trailers, adverts and Press appearances saturating the media. Whether the hype should be believed remains to be seen.