David Lean in the context of "Empire of the Sun (film)"

British cinema has significantly influenced the global film industry since the 19th century. The oldest known surviving film in the world, Roundhay Garden Scene (1888), was shot in England by French inventor Louis Le Prince. Early colour films were also pioneered in the UK. Film production reached an all-time high in 1936, but the "golden age" of British cinema is usually thought to have occurred in the 1940s, which saw the release of the most critically acclaimed works by filmmakers such as David Lean, Michael Powell, and Carol Reed.

Many British actors have accrued critical success and worldwide recognition, including Alec Guinness, Patrick Stewart, Julie Andrews, Michael Caine, Joan Collins, Sean Connery, Olivia Colman, Benedict Cumberbatch, Daniel Craig, Daniel Day-Lewis, Judi Dench, Helen Mirren, Olivia de Havilland, Audrey Hepburn, Anthony Hopkins, Glynis Johns, Vivien Leigh, Ian Mckellen, Peter O'Toole, Gary Oldman, Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud, Maggie Smith, Joan Plowright, Emma Thompson, Rachel Weisz, Kate Winslet and Keira Knightley. Some of the films with the largest ever box office profits have been made in the United Kingdom, including Harry Potter and James Bond, the fourth and fifth highest-grossing film franchises of all time.

Sir Alec Guinness (born Alec Guinness de Cuffe; 2 April 1914 – 5 August 2000) was an English actor. In the BFI listing of the 100 most important British films of the 20th century, he was the single most noted actor, represented across nine films—six in starring roles and three in supporting roles—including five directed by David Lean and four from Ealing Studios. He won an Academy Award, a BAFTA, a Golden Globe a Tony Award and a Volpi Cup. In 1959, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for services to the arts. He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1960, the Academy Honorary Award for lifetime achievement in 1980 and the BAFTA Academy Fellowship Award in 1989.

Guinness began his stage career in 1934. Two years later, at the age of 22, he played the role of Osric in Hamlet in the West End and joined the Old Vic. He continued to play Shakespearean roles throughout his career. He served in the Royal Naval Reserve during the Second World War and commanded a landing craft during the invasion of Sicily and Elba. Along with Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud and Ralph Richardson, he was one of the great British theatre actors who made the transition to films after the war, making his name in six Ealing comedies, starting in 1949 with both A Run for Your Money and Kind Hearts and Coronets (in which he played eight different characters). He went on to lead roles in 1951 with The Man in the White Suit and The Lavender Hill Mob (for which he received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor), then in 1955 with The Ladykillers, and culminating in 1957 with Barnacle Bill.

Geraldine Leigh Chaplin (born July 31, 1944) is an actress whose long career has included multilingual roles in English, Spanish, French, Italian, and German films.

Geraldine is a daughter of Charlie Chaplin, the first of his eight children with his fourth wife, Oona O'Neill, and thus a granddaughter of playwright Eugene O'Neill. After beginnings in dance and modeling, she turned her attention to acting, and made her English-language acting debut (and came to prominence in what would be a Golden Globe–nominated role) as Tonya in David Lean's Doctor Zhivago (1965). She made her Broadway acting debut in Lillian Hellman's The Little Foxes in 1967, and played ancient Egyptian Queen Nefertiti in Raúl Araiza's Nefertiti and Akhenaton (Nefertiti y Aquenatos) (1973) alongside Egyptian actor Salah Zulfikar. Chaplin received her second Golden Globe nomination for Robert Altman's Nashville (1975). She received a BAFTA nomination for her role in Welcome to L.A. (1976). She played her grandmother Hannah Chaplin in the biopic Chaplin (1992), for which she received her third Golden Globe nomination.

Nigel Allan Havers (born 6 November 1951) is an English actor and presenter. His film roles include Lord Andrew Lindsay in the 1981 British film Chariots of Fire, which earned him a BAFTA nomination; as Dr. Rawlins in the 1987 Steven Spielberg war drama Empire of the Sun; and as Ronny in the 1984 David Lean epic A Passage to India. Television roles include Tom Latimer in the British TV comedy series Don't Wait Up and Lewis Archer in Coronation Street, between 2009 and 2019.

The Bridge on the River Kwai is a 1957 epic war film directed by David Lean and based on the novel The Bridge over the River Kwai, written by Pierre Boulle. Boulle's novel and the film's screenplay are almost entirely fictional but use the construction of the Burma Railway in 1942–1943 as its historical setting. It stars William Holden, Alec Guinness, and Jack Hawkins, with Sessue Hayakawa, James Donald, Ann Sears, and Geoffrey Horne in supporting roles.

The film was initially scripted by screenwriter Carl Foreman, who was later replaced by Michael Wilson. Both writers had to work in secret since they were on the Hollywood blacklist and had fled to the UK to continue working. As a result, Boulle, who did not speak English, was credited and received the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay; many years later, Foreman and Wilson posthumously received the Academy Award.