James Bond actress Eva Green has won her High Court battle with a production company over the collapse of a multimillion-pound sci-fi film.

The Casino Royale star was due to appear in a £4 million sci-fi film titled A Patriot but filming was abandoned in October 2019.

She sued White Lantern Film, a Dorset-based film company, claiming she was entitled to her $1 million (£812,000) fee for the project despite its cancellation.

However, White Lantern Film and lender SMC Speciality Finance brought a counter-claim against Ms Green, alleging she undermined the independent film's production and renounced the contract.

In a judgment on Friday, Mr Justice Michael Green ruled in Ms Green's favour, ruling she was entitled to the fee, and dismissed the counter-claim.

"In particular, I find that Ms Green did not renounce her obligations under the artist agreement; nor did she commit any repudiatory breaches of it," the judge said.

'Character assassination'

During the trial in London earlier this year, Max Mallin KC, for White Lantern, said Ms Green had shown a "categorical and unequivocal refusal to perform" and repeatedly made "unreasonable demands".

However, Edmund Cullen KC, for Ms Green, said the actress had been subjected to a "character assassination", adding it was "based on some of the cheapest and nastiest sorts of stereotypes around".

During her evidence, Ms Green denied the allegations that she was not prepared to go ahead with the project, saying: "In the 20 years that I have been making films, I have never broken a contract or even missed one day of shooting."

In messages used in the claim, the court heard that the actress had described potential crew members as "s***** peasants", the production as a "B-s*****-movie" and executive producer Jake Seal as "pure vomit".

In the further messages, Ms Green is also said to have described Mr Seal as a "sociopath" and "a real mad dictator who wants to prove he is right so he could be ready for anything".

Ms Green, who gave oral evidence at the High Court in London over two days in January, said it was "humiliating" to have her messages used in court.

In a 71-page judgment in Eva Green's favour, Mr Justice Michael Green said there was an "overinterpretation" of private messages in the case.

He said: "There was, indeed, much reference to Ms Green's private messages and both sides were accusing each other of pretending to be in a position to make the film at the end of September 2019.

"The reality is, however, that neither side was prepared to make the film that the other wanted to make: Ms Green made it clear that she did not want to make the film under Mr Seal's full control; and the defendants were only interested in recovering SMC's loan."

He later added: "The case is relatively straightforward, it seems to me, both factually and legally - there was little dispute on the law - but it has been complicated by convoluted and overtechnical theories as to what happened and the purportedly malign strategies being adopted by the other side at the time.

"In my view, there has also been an overinterpretation of the recordings' transcripts and private messages."