Star role at sale for big screen's classic car

GENEVIEVE, veteran of both cinema and motoring history, is to be sold tonight, writes Dalya Alberge.

The world's most famous car - a model with character and star quality - appeared in the 1953 film Genevieve, a comedy about a young couple taking their 1904 12HP Darracq on the London to Brighton run.

Genevieve's last owner was Paul Terry, an Australian businessman killed in an air crash earlier this year. Mr Terry bought it in 1989 for pounds 289,000, which the auctioneers Brooks said was 'many times the amount that would have been realised by a similar car without Genevieve's unique history'.

Elles, a rare, complete set of one of Toulouse-Lautrec's best- known series of lithographs was sold by Christie's yesterday for pounds 441,500, against an estimate of between pounds 280,000 and pounds 350,000.

(Photograph omitted)