Match Point is a 2005 film written and directed by Woody Allen about Chris Wilton (played by Jonathan Rhys-Meyers), a young tennis pro from Ireland. It also stars Scarlett Johansson. It is the first of Allen's films to be shot in England and his first film since Love and Death to be entirely shot outside of the United States. The film showcases famous London locations such as Tate Modern, Norman Foster's "Gherkin", Richard Rogers' Lloyds building, the Royal Opera House, the Palace of Westminster, Blackfriars Bridge and Cambridge Circus. The thriller is a vehicle for Allen's long-held belief in the power of luck in determining people's destiny (including his own).

The movie had its premiere on May 12, 2005 at the Cannes Film Festival, where it was shown outside the competition. It was critically acclaimed as one of Woody Allen's finest recent films.

Match Point has been nominated for four Golden Globe Awards: Best Motion Picture - Drama, Johansson for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture and Allen for Best Director - Motion Picture and Best Screenplay - Motion Picture. The nomination marks the first Golden Globe nomination for Allen since 1987 (for Hannah and Her Sisters).

The film opens with the following voice-over, spoken by the principal character, tennis coach Chris.

The man who said "I'd rather be lucky than good" saw deeply into life. People are afraid to face how great a part of life is dependent on luck. It's scary to think so much is out of one's control. There are moments in a match when the ball hits the top of the net and for a split second it can either go forward or fall back. With a little luck it goes forward and you win. Or maybe it doesn't and you lose.

Wilton, after realizing that he does not have what it takes to become a successful professional tennis player, takes a job at an exclusive English country club. He befriends Hewett (Matthew Goode), a rich young playboy. He begins a relationship with Hewett's sister, Chloe (Emily Mortimer), more out of friendship than any real passion. He does experience passion with Hewett's girlfriend, the aspiring actress Nola Rice (Scarlett Johansson). A few years later, Chris has married Chloe and has a comfortable job in her father's firm. He begins an affair with Nola, and she becomes pregnant. He promises her to divorce Chloe, but hesitates. Nola demands that he talks to Chloe about the situation, and threatens to otherwise do that herself.

After discussing the matter with a trusted old friend, he concludes that he does not love Nola enough to give up his comfortable life with Chloe.

Chris conceives and executes an elaborate plot to use a shotgun from his father-in-law's household to kill Nola's next door neighbour (Margaret Tyzack), take some of the neighbour's belongings, and then wait for Nola to get home from work and kill her. He strengthens his alibi by going to a musical with his wife just after the murders.

As planned, the police (Steve Pemberton, Ewen Bremner, James Nesbitt) take it for primarily a drug murder on the neighbour, and the additional murder of Nola, because she happened to pass by. During and after the crimes several risky situations occur, which could have revealed Chris' involvement. However, each time Chris is lucky.

As a result, police decide that Chris is innocent; although one police officer's theory corresponds to what actually happened, his colleague discards it as too unlikely.

The movie is surprisingly dark and shocking for an Allen movie, concentrating on the tension between Wilton and Nola, and his wife Chloe. Dostoevsky's novel Crime and Punishment is an important intertext in the movie. Wilton tries to juggle both women in his life at the same time, trying to hide the truth from both of them. Mortimer plays the innocent, rather naive but jovial Chloe, who never had to worry about anything in her life because it was always provided for by her father and loving family. She assumes the good in one person, including her husband, who she does suspect of infidelity at one point, but accepts his denials at face-value. Nola on the other hand is by far more suspicious about Wilton's intents, telling him already in the beginning to "stop playing games" with her. Her approach is by far more aggressive and self-confident, this self-confidence seems to be a facade though is later revealed. After the initial tryst in the wheat-field on the Hewett's estate, she tells Wilton that it was just a short affair. He however cannot accept that. After hearing of her break-up with Chloe's brother Tom, he tries to win her back so many times that she finally succumbs, even begging for her phone number in the Tate Modern while his wife was standing in the back.

The character of Wilton seems to be drawn and torn to both women in his life, his fiancée and later wife Chloe and his hot affair with Nola. He genuinely seems to care and love his wife, however she can never give him the sexual satisfaction and thrills that Nola provided. Both women offer him aspects in life that the other is not providing.

There is some debate whether in fact Nola was pregnant, or if she was trying to keep Wilton that way. Either way, the situation ultimately leads to her murder, as Wilton sees the balance that he has achieved between both women endangered, potentially threatening all that he has achieved and sensing his downfall.

The movie features Rhys-Meyers as the sultry, deep, and complex young upshot into higher society, Johansson as the initally very self-confident, sexy and seductive, but apparently neurotic luckless American actress. Many actors are featured who were well-known in Britain, but not to a wider international audience before. The movie can be regarded as Rhys-Meyers' great international breakthrough, with another prominent performance by Johansson, well known British actors Emily Mortimer, Matthew Goode, Brian Cox and Penelope Wilton as the posh, upper-class parents of Tom and Chloe, Margaret Tyzack as the doomed neighbour Mrs. Eastby, Ewen Bremner and James Nesbitt as the luckless police.

The film has an unusual soundtrack consisting almost entirely of old pre-war recordings of opera arias (many sung by Enrico Caruso) at critical dramatic moments in the film. These are intertwined with the live performances that the characters attend over the course of the film. Pieces include work by Verdi, Donizetti, Bizet, Carlos Gomes, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Gioacchino Rossini.