Vanessa Davies was walking her pug in Richmond Park when the idea for a film came to her. She noticed how dogs can bring complete strangers together, people who would never have spoken or interacted before, were brought together by their dogs and so the idea for Patrick was born.

Described by Vanessa as a ‘love letter to Richmond,’ it was filmed entirely in the area. Staring Bettie Edmondson, Jennifer Saunders and Ed Skrein, Patrick is about a young women, whose life is a mess. Sarah, played by Bettie, inherits her grandmother's spoiled pug, Patrick. She doesn’t like dogs but there must be a reason why her grandmother left her the pug.

Vanessa said: “It [filming in Richmond] was a very simple choice, I have lived in the area for many years and the film was inspired here. We loved filming here, there are so many nice areas and we tried to get all of Richmond into the film.”

Vanessa drew inspiration from her personal life for this film. Not only is it based in Richmond but the dog in the filmed was inspired and named after he own pug. She said: “A pug was the obvious choice, they have a cute-ugly look and they have a sense of humour.

“My dog, Patrick, will be watching the film with me when it is out, I am sure he won’t stay quite. He wouldn’t stop barking when I was working on it and heard someone shout his name!”

“I knew from my time working on the Harry Potter films and Star Wars, that Julie Tottman is an excellent dog trainer and Harley, who played Patrick, was excellent to work with. Everyone involved was lovely. Bettie’s humour really comes across in the film, everyone was really happy to be on set.”

This is Vanessa’s first venture into writing a film and has already started working on her next film idea. She has worked in the film industry for a number of years but as a publicist.

She said: “It was a bit unusual and surreal not being on the publicist side of things, but I loved it. It was something I believed in, we just wanted to make a feel good family friendly film.”

Following the film screening at Curzon, Richmond on Tuesday, June 27, Vanessa described her delight after watching the whole film, she said: “It was so amazing to see Richmond in all its glory on the big screen, the park, the view across the Star and Garter, the riverside and Turner’s View. We were all thrilled to hear so much laughter and also a few tears from our audience, so hopefully we’ve done our job!” Patrick will be released by Buena Vista International UK on 29th June.