Moving pictures locations

Ever wanted to re-enact the famous scene from Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994) where Hugh Grant and Andie MacDowell make love on that magnificent four-poster?

Ever wanted to re-enact the famous scene from Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994) where Hugh Grant and Andie MacDowell make love on that magnificent four-poster? Well, you can - if you book yourself into the Crown Hotel in Amersham, Bucks (0870 4008103). Originally a 16th-century coaching inn, the hotel has 37 bedrooms, but the one you're after is the Elizabeth I Four Poster Suite (£205 B&B per person per night). Book at least a month in advance to avoid disappointment. In the film, the hotel is called the Lucky Boatman, with exteriors filmed up the road at the picturesque King's Arms Hotel (01494 726333); a two-course Sunday lunch with coffee costs £16.

Hugh Grant, the mainstay of Britflick romcoms (that's British-made romantic comedies), also starred in that other Richard Curtis blockbuster, Notting Hill (1999). When Julia Roberts, playing film star Anna Scott, appears in a film version of an unnamed Henry James book - in other words, an actress playing an actress in a film within a film - the director, Roger Michell, chose the beautiful 18th-century Kenwood House in Hampstead, north London (020-8348 1286) as his backdrop. The splendid neo-classical façade covers a brick building dating back to 1616, and the house boasts a unique collection of paintings by such artists as Van Dyck, Rembrandt and Turner. This weekend you can go on a self-guided Valentine's Trail around the 112-acre grounds. Tickets cost £1 and allow you to enter a prize draw for a meal for two at the famed Italian restaurant La Gaffe (020-7435 8965; www.lagaffe.co.uk).

Appropriately, considering that Kenwood was owned by the Mansfield family until 1922, the 1999 film adaptation of Jane Austen's Mansfield Park made extensive use of the house and gardens also.

And while we're on the subject of Jane Austen, the nation's female pulses raced when Colin Firth emerged from an early-morning dip in the BBC's 1995 television adaptation of Pride and Prejudice. For this sequence, the production used the magnificent Italianate mansion of Lyme Park in Disley, Cheshire (01663 762023). But while Firth (Mr Darcy) actually swam in a pond in the park, he emerged, wet shirt and all, in front of the main lake where Elizabeth Bennet (Jennifer Ehle) looks at him with a barely restrained eye. Swimming may not be allowed, but you can still explore the 17-acre Victorian gardens when they reopen at the end of March. The interiors for Pemberley, Mr Darcy's estate, were shot miles away at Sudbury Hall in Ashbourne, Derbyshire (01283 585337): it will open from 2 April.

Another perennial favourite of 19th-century romantic literature is Wuthering Heights. For Emily Brontë's tragic tale of love and revenge set in the bleak landscape of the Yorkshire Moors, a genuine farmhouse (sans electricity and running water - what fun) was used as the Heights in the 1971 film starring a youthful Timothy Dalton. Weston Hall, near Otley, stood in for Thrushcross Grange, home to Edgar Linton (Ian Ogilvy), the man Cathy (Anna Calder-Marshall) marries after rejecting Heathcliff. When she realises her mistake and runs after Dalton, she does so around the ominous Brimham Rocks, four miles east of Pateley Bridge, off the B6265.

For the 1992 version, Juliette Binoche does the same thing around specially erected fake boulders on Boss Moor, just north of Skipton. Nearby, close to the village of Grassington, more film fakery saw Heathcliff's house erected as a Gothic folly on the skyline. Pretty, but hardly sensible. This time the role of Thrushcross Grange was played by Broughton Hall, a 70-room mansion that is now a business park (01756 799608).

A golf club might not sound like the most romantic venue, yet the five-star Stoke Park Club (01753 717171; ww.stokeparkclub. com) in Stoke Poges, Bucks, played a major role in Bridget Jones's Diary (2001). It was here that Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant) took Bridget (Renée Zellweger) for a luxury romantic break. After an afternoon spent falling out of rowing boats in the club's lake, the couple retire to the Pennsylvania Suite with - you've guessed it - another huge four-poster bed. (In these films, it's clearly impossible to have a good time on an ordinary king-size.) For £470 per head, you can enjoy a Bridget Jones's Diary Package, consisting of a two-night stay in the Pennsylvania Suite, a chilled bottle of Chardonnay and a platter of chocolate-dipped strawberries on arrival, three-course table d'hôte dinner and full English breakfast - a copy of Bridget's comestibles - and complimentary use of the Health and Racquet Pavilion.

James Bond fans may recognise the 18th green on the golf course. This is where 007 (Sean Connery) defeated Auric Goldfinger (Gert Frobe) in Goldfinger (1964). Alas, Connery is not included in the Valentine's package.

Finally, we come bang up to date with Love Actually, yet another hit from Richard Curtis. An all-star cast (rumour has it that there are one or two British actors who don't appear), a twisted tangle of eccentric love stories and a rose-tinted tourists'-eye view of London: how could it fail? Landmarks include Hamleys toyshop (also used in 1999 by Stanley Kubrick in his disappointing final film, Eyes Wide Shut), the London Eye, Selfridges department store, Tate Modern (also seen in Bridget Jones's Diary) and the floodlit skating rink at Somerset House. But not a four-poster in sight - amazing.

REVISITING THE ROMANCE OF THE RAILWAYS

When David Lean was hired to direct the archetypal stiff-upper-lip romance Brief Encounter - arguably the most romantic film ever made - in 1945, he was originally offered a site in the London area. Rumour has it that Watford Junction was a prime contender, but Hitler scuppered that idea. It was felt that the strong arc lights used to illuminate night shooting would have attracted too much enemy attention. In addition, V-1 and V-2 rockets were raining down on the capital at the time. So the action shifted to Carnforth in Lancashire, a small-town station on the West Coast Main Line.

Brief Encounter was adapted from Noël Coward's 1935 stage play, Still Life. Expanded by Coward into a screenplay, the film tells the story of a doctor and a housewife, played by Trevor Howard and Celia Johnson, who meet by chance in the café of a suburban railway station. Cast and crew descended on Carnforth one cold winter evening in February 1945 for a fortnight of filming. The station's real café wasn't photogenic enough for Lean, and so a mocked-up version consisting of several scenery flats was erected next to the main building. The station's clock, an ever-present reminder of the couples' scant courtship time, has recently been restored to its 19th-century splendour. London-Glasgow trains no longer call, but you can catch a train to Cumbria or Lancaster. A Brief Encounter Café and Heritage Centre now sit proudly on the station's middle platform.

Carnforth railway station (01524 734 311; www.carnforth-station.co.uk)

Compare Travel Insurance - 5 day Euro cover from £4.33 and Annual worldwide policies from just £43.08