Plot
William Thacker owns a travel book store in Notting Hill, London. Divorced from his wife who left him for another man (who resembles Harrison Ford), he shares a flat with Spike, a flaky and sloppy Welshman.
One day, famous Hollywood actress Anna Scott enters the shop and buys a book. Shortly after she leaves, Will goes to buy his colleague Martin a juice, but bumps into Anna while rounding a street corner, spilling it on her. He takes her to his flat across the street so she can change. When leaving, she impulsively kisses him.
Anna later invites Will to visit her at the Ritz Hotel. There, he is mistaken for a reporter and ushered into a press event for her new film. When asked, Will says he writes for Horse & Hound magazine. Anna asks to be William's date at his sister Honey's birthday party later that evening. Though his friends and family are surprised, she gets on well with everyone and enjoys herself. Later, the two enter a private neighbourhood park, where Anna again kisses Will.
At a restaurant, Will and Anna overhear a party of men at a nearby table discussing her, first praising and then disparaging her and equating actresses to prostitutes. He confronts them, then she introduces herself and calmly insults the stunned men.
Anna invites Will to her hotel room, but after discovering that her movie star boyfriend, Jeff, has unexpectedly arrived from America, he leaves. Over the next six months, Will's friends Max, Bella, Bernie and Tony arrange a series of dates for him, but Will, heartsick over Anna, is uninterested in another relationship.
One day, a distraught Anna appears at Will's doorstep, needing to hide due to a tabloid scandal. She apologises about Jeff and says their relationship is over. They discover shared interests, and discuss Will's print of Marc Chagall's 1950 painting La Mariée. Anna says it shows "how love should be" and that "happiness isn't happiness without a violin-playing goat" as depicted in the painting. They have sex that night. The next morning paparazzi, inadvertently tipped off by Spike, besiege the house and take photos of Will, Anna, and a half-dressed Spike at the front door. Furious, she blames Will and leaves.
Several seasons pass, and Will remains miserable. When he discovers that Anna is back in London making a film based on a Henry James novel, something he had suggested, he visits the set unannounced. She asks him to wait until the shooting is done, but he leaves when overhearing her being dismissive about him to another actor.
Anna comes to the bookshop the next day, bringing a wrapped gift. Will says he overheard what she said about him to her co-star. Anna explains that she was merely trying to keep her personal life private. She proclaims that she loves him, and pleads to rekindle their relationship. Will refuses, explaining that he would not recover if she left him again.
Will meets his friends and sister at a restaurant with Anna's partly opened gift: Chagall's original La Mariée ("The Bride"). They halfheartedly support his decision about Anna until Spike arrives and calls him a "daft prick". Will admits his mistake, and everyone races across London to find Anna, who is holding a press conference at the Savoy Hotel. They arrive just as her publicist, in answer to a question about how long Anna will stay in Britain, announces that Anna is taking a year off and is leaving the UK that night.
A reporter asks about the embarrassing photographs taken at Will's flat, and Anna says they are just friends. Will, again portraying a reporter from Horse and Hound, asks her if she would consider being more than friends if he begs her forgiveness. She says she would, then requests a reporter to repeat his question, "How long are you intending to stay here in Britain?" Smiling, she answers "Indefinitely".
Anna and Will marry, their wedding cake featuring the violin-playing goat from La Mariée. Spike and Honey also marry. Anna is later seen to be pregnant as she and Will spend time in the private park that they visited on their first date.
