In Twenty 20-Fav, we’re spending 2025 examining the work of actor/director Jon Favreau. This week’s film is Wimbledon, a romantic comedy about tennis players Paul Bettany and Kirsten Dunst.
Tennis is a sport I know next to nothing about. The only thing I really know about tennis is that at some point in the last ten years, boomers got too old to play it anymore, and so to soothe their fragile egos they invented the sport of pickleball. Despite this, even a dum-dum like me knows what a big deal the Wimbledon Championships are. So setting a romantic comedy amidst the backdrop of British tennis culture, with the tournament as the setting, makes perfect sense. Almost inevitable. And it’s telling that the only other tennis movie I can think of in the twenty years since Wimbledon is last year’s Challengers1.
Wimbledon follows veteran tennis pro Peter Colt (Paul Bettany), who’s about to retire from the sport to take a cushy gig as the tennis instructor at a British country club full of leering older women. But first, he’s landed himself a wild card slot at the Wimbledon tournament, in what he’s decided will be his last professional competition. He checks into his hotel and suddenly finds himself in the wrong room, walking in on young upstart tennis pro Lizzie (Kirsten Dunst) just getting out of the shower. After lingering for far too long, Peter excuses himself and meets her again on the practice court. She’s playing in the women’s tournament, it turns out, and so they agree whoever wins their first round has to treat the other to dinner.
Peter wins his first match and, as promised, treats Lizzie—who also won her first match—to some celebratory fish and chips and also sex. He then goes on to win the second round, sleeps with Lizzie again, and again a third time. Soon Peter begins to believe the common denominator in his winning streak is all the sex he’s suddenly having. Everyone around him can see the trouble brewing. His best friend and tennis partner Dieter (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) ribs him about it until the two wind up having to face off in the tournament. Lizzie’s overbearing father (Hunt for the Wilderpeople‘s Sam Neill) tries his damnedest to keep her away from Peter, knowing it’s throwing her off her game to be swooning over some British guy. Meanwhile Peter’s brother Carl (Dark Phoenix‘s James McAvoy) can’t help but be a nuisance, constantly betting on his brother to lose, because Peter’s luck’s gotta run out eventually, right?
After a public fistfight with Lizzie’s ex Jake Hammond (Austin Nichols), the number one seed in the tournament, Peter flees the scene with Lizzie, driving all night to his hometown of Brighton while things cool off. This is where most of the film’s real rom-com-y stuff happens. Peter shows Lizzie around his childhood stomping grounds, which include a derelict tennis court/amusement park combo. The court is littered with broken down bumper cars, the arcade visibly abandoned in the background. It’s a nice touch that makes Brighton seem like a town that’s well past it’s prime, but that’s not even the story being told here. Anyway, they talk about their hopes and dreams, their philosophies on tennis and life and all that fun stuff. His parents are also in town, having a spat where mom (Eleanor Bron) has been cheating on dad (Bernard Hill) to try and teach him a lesson about manliness or something, and dad’s response is to move out of the house and into his sons’ old treehouse. Why Peter never brings Lizzie around to meet them is obvious, but it still seems like the movie would have gone there.
The standard third act rom-com misunderstanding comes as Lizzie’s dad convinces her to stop seeing Peter and focus on her own tennis playing. But that’s not the tipping point. The tipping point comes soon after as Peter sneaks into Lizzie’s bedroom one night and talks her into sleeping with him before the big match the next day. Peter wins his match because his good luck sex charm does its magic once again. Meanwhile, Lizzie is too sleep-deprived and agitated from all the sex to even focus on her own match, ultimately knocking her out of the tournament. She flies into a rage over this (rightfully so), dumps Peter and books the next flight back home. The movie kinda glides over the fact that she melts down on the court often, early on showing us footage of the last public meltdown she had (with John “Meltdowns Are Kinda My Thing” McEnroe commentating, to boot). You’d think her own fragile ego and/or tennis acumen would be a bigger talking point for her. Like she ought to be able to tell Peter no her own self every once in a while, right? Instead, Sam Neill has to do her dirty work for her.
There’s a weird bit of sports superstition involved in Peter’s choices here. You always hear of people doing silly little rituals, like wearing the same pair of underwear throughout the World Series, because they think it’ll help their team win. And I’m sure players do the same thing. That’s just how we’re wired as people. We’ll do whatever it takes to win, even if it’s an ultimately meaningless gesture. The Indiana Pacers neither know nor care if your shoes are untied during the NBA finals. But if it helps ease your mind, then sure, go for it bud. You could cross your fingers and the outcome would be the same. Just like how Peter could probably just crank one out in the locker room before his next match and the result would likely be the same2.
Where Peter crosses the line and completely fucks up is in forgetting that Lizzie is not only a) not a lucky rabbit’s foot he can rub whenever it suits him, but also b) on the same athletic journey he is. She wants to win at Wimbledon just as much as he does. But she doesn’t, because it turns out this is his story and not hers. Because this isn’t really a romantic comedy. This is a sports movie about one athlete and his sudden drive to be the best. His story is one of a veteran ending his career on top. Lizzie will have more chances at Wimbledon in the future, so that makes it okay for her to literally get screwed out of it this time, right? No, of course not, but that’s kinda how the movie makes it seem.
I could see a version of this film where the dynamic is flipped, and Peter has to begrudgingly put his career to bed while Lizzie goes on the hot streak and becomes the next big thing. It would be bittersweet, but it would seem more true to life, I think; the older generation having to cede the limelight for the younger upstarts, even if in this case there’s more at stake than simply a trophy.
Wimbledon is a perfectly fine little movie. Critically, I don’t have much to add about it. Paul Bettany has always felt like a bit of an intense performer, even in his more comedic roles, so it’s kinda nice to see him playing a romantic lead in a light sports movie like this. And speaking of sports, we get some real in-your-face tennis action here, with full CGI tennis balls flying every which way, super slow-motion serves, all that fun stuff. It reminds me of some of the flashy billiards shots in Scorsese’s The Color of Money. It doesn’t add anything to the overall story, but it illustrates the kind of pent up energy that our athletes are burning off during a match.
I really don’t know how to end this piece, so I’ll wrap things up by saying that no film really encapsulates 2004 like Wimbledon. The soundtrack features OK Go, Avril Lavigne and David Gray, three of the most Early Aughts artists imaginable. It comes from that era just before everything went all digital. CRT televisions, Nokia cell phones, that very distinct futurist design where everything had big, round chrome edges. It’s not often you can pinpoint the exact moment a film was released, but Wimbledon is a time capsule that absolutely screams early 2004. That happens to also be the exact moment I graduated high school, so for purely nostalgia-related reasons, I can’t help but enjoy the look of this one.
THE FAVREAU DIMENSION
Favreau shows up halfway through playing Ron Roth, Peter’s agent. He gets to play a fast-talking, bullshitting turd of a human being who’s only interested in Peter as long as he can make money off him. He’s back in Swingers/Made mode here, and it’s fun seeing that energy return here. And wouldn’t ya know it? Ron is Jake Hammond’s rep too! The championship match comes down to Peter and Jake, so he gets to observe the fact that no matter who wins, he’ll be raking in the dough. What a shit, this guy.
It’s also worth noting that Paul Bettany will be appearing in this column quite a lot moving forward.
FINAL RATING
3.5 stars (out of 5). S’pretty good.
NEXT TIME: Favreau proves to the bean counters he can be trusted with special effects.
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