Tennis tale a smash hit

Romantic comedy Wimbledon has powered its way to the number one spot at the UK box-office.

12:08 29 September 2004

Romantic comedy Wimbledon has powered its way to the number one spot at the UK box-office.

Tipped as a tennis turkey, British director Richard Loncraine's (The Gathering Storm, Band Of Brothers) movie about a has-been tennis player rekindling past glories, has defied the odds by knocking Tom Cruise thriller 'Collateral' from the top spot.

Starring the endearingly goofy Paul Bettany as Peter, and sassy Kirsten Dunst as Lizzy, the Brit-flick was torn to shreds by critics who slammed its weak gags and improbable plot.

Dunst, meanwhile, was roundly panned for what was regarded as a shrill and precocious performance as love interest Lizzy, who served to spur tennis counterpart Peter's career comeback.

While criticism of the film seems to carry weight the movie's success could perhaps have been pre-empted, on past form alone.

The film comes from the same stable as Four Weddings And A Funeral, Notting Hill and Love Actually (with more or less the same plot structure - even down to the pushy American) have all exposed the unrelenting British appetite for feel-good, home-grown movies.

Outside of SW19, Collateral was still popular in second place - raking in a gross figure of 4.8 million pounds. Chinese mediaeval martial-arts masterpiece Hero was a new entry at number three, while the Vince Vaughn and Ben Stiller's Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story was fourth.

Steven Spielberg's quirky airport comedy The Terminal, starring Tom Hanks and Catherine Zeta-Jones, dropped to fifth.