The film covers a 15-year period, from 1916 to 1931, and cinematographer Michael Ballhaus - who was Oscar-nominated for Broadcast News and The Fabulous Baker Boys and last worked with Redford on Quiz Show - selected three different visual styles. A monochrome look was used for WWI; bright colours for the twenties Jazz Age; and a more muted palette for the Depression. Plus, of course, a lot of green, since much of the film takes place on a golf course.

The three golfing legends line up for the final confrontation.

And that, it turned out, was one of the production’s greatest problems: both the game and the courses on which it is played have changed hugely since the thirties, with greens becoming smaller and fairways becoming smoother. Knickerbockers, sweaters and socks, once de rigueur in the clothing department, have given way to immensely lucrative leisure-wear. And the hickory-wood clubs handle quite differently from today’s graphite, steel and titanium variety. In the end, although the film was shot on a real golf course, Oscar-winning production designer Stuart Craig ended up creating a whole new 18th hole - a 220-yard par five.

But all concerned go to considerable lengths to stress that The Legend of Bagger Vance is not really a golf movie. Smith, a self-confessed golf junkie, is the first to admit that golf is a kind of metaphor for something else in the film. “What’s great about golf,” he says, “is that it allows the average person to taste perfection. That one shot, that one hole… you can be the best in the world at that moment, and then you spend the rest of your golf career chasing that. Golf is so simple and so difficult - the wonderful oxymoron of life.”

Charlize Theron as Adele, who has battles of her own to fight.

“It’s about a character who loses his swing - his authentic swing - and has to find it again,” explains Redford. “And, in that sense, it’s universal, because we all lose our swing in one way or another at some point in our lives. We’re all tested by adversity, and I suspect that all of us have at some time hoped for someone like Bagger Vance to come along and help us through.”

Damon, however, needed his Bagger Vance before he could even start work. The actor, who spends half the film with a club in his hand, had never actually handled one before he began training with PGA master professional Tim Moss. “In order to present Matt as a legitimate player,” says the latter. “I had two choices: I could make him a cosmetic player, or I could teach him really to hit the golf ball. Since there were so many golf shots to be played, I decided the best thing to do would be to teach him exactly as I would anyone else - to turn him into a fundamentally sound player.

“I believed that, with the fundamentals under his belt, the cosmetics would naturally follow - and that’s exactly what happened. I have never seen anyone take to the game as quickly as he did. Matt is a good athlete: his hand-eye co-ordination is just phenomenal and he worked very hard.”

As for Damon, despite many days of blistered hands and a separated rib from when he swung especially hard, he is now “completely addicted to the game”. In other words, one might say he has found his authentic swing.