The Bridge on the River Kwai is a 1957 epic war film directed by David Lean and based on the 1952 novel written by Pierre Boulle. Although the film uses the historical setting of the construction of the Burma Railway in 1942–1943, the plot and characters of Boulle's novel and the screenplay are almost entirely fictional. The cast includes William Holden, Alec Guinness, Jack Hawkins, and Sessue Hayakawa.
Sir David Lean was an English film director, producer, screenwriter and editor. Widely considered one of the most important figures in British cinema, Lean directed the large-scale epics The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), Lawrence of Arabia (1962), Doctor Zhivago (1965), and A Passage to India (1984). He also directed the film adaptations of two Charles Dickens novels, Great Expectations (1946) and Oliver Twist (1948), as well as the romantic drama Brief Encounter (1945).
William Holden was an American actor, and one of the biggest box-office draws of the 1950s. Holden won the Academy Award for Best Actor for the film Stalag 17 (1953) and the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited Series or Movie for the television film The Blue Knight (1973). Holden starred in some of Hollywood's most popular and critically acclaimed films, including Sunset Boulevard (1950), Sabrina (1954), Picnic (1955), The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), The Wild Bunch (1969) and Network (1976). He was named one of the "Top 10 Stars of the Year" six times, and appeared as 25th on the American Film Institute's list of 25 greatest male stars of Classical Hollywood cinema.
Pierre François Marie Louis Boulle was a French novelist best known for two works, The Bridge over the River Kwai (1952) and Planet of the Apes (1963), that were both made into award-winning films.
The year 1957 in film involved some significant events. The Bridge on the River Kwai topped the year's box office in North America, France, and Germany, and won seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture.
Ordet, is a 1955 Danish drama film, directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer. It is based on a play by Kaj Munk, a Danish Lutheran priest, first performed in 1932. The film won the Golden Lion at the 16th Venice International Film Festival, and was the only film by Dreyer to be both a critical and financial success.
Carl Foreman, CBE was an American screenwriter and film producer who wrote the award-winning films The Bridge on the River Kwai and High Noon, among others. He was one of the screenwriters who were blacklisted in Hollywood in the 1950s because of their suspected communist sympathy or membership in the Communist Party.
The 60th National Board of Review Awards were announced on December 13, 1988, and given on February 27, 1989.
The 29th Academy Awards were held on March 27, 1957, to honor the films of 1956.
The 30th Academy Awards ceremony was held on March 26, 1958, to honor the best films of 1957.
The 23rd New York Film Critics Circle Awards, honored the best filmmaking of 1957.
The 33rd National Board of Review Awards were announced on December 19, 1961.
The 48th National Board of Review Awards were announced on December 22, 1976.
The 11th British Film Awards, given by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, were held on 6 March 1958, to honor the best national and foreign films of 1957.
Sir Alec Guinness was an English actor. After an early career on the stage, Guinness was featured in several of the Ealing comedies, including Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949), in which he played nine different characters, The Lavender Hill Mob (1951), for which he received his first Academy Award nomination, and The Ladykillers (1955). He collaborated six times with director David Lean: Herbert Pocket in Great Expectations (1946), Fagin in Oliver Twist (1948), Col. Nicholson in The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), for which he won both the Academy Award for Best Actor and the BAFTA Award for Best Actor, Prince Faisal in Lawrence of Arabia (1962), General Yevgraf Zhivago in Doctor Zhivago (1965), and Professor Godbole in A Passage to India (1984). In 1970, he played Jacob Marley's ghost in Ronald Neame's Scrooge. He also portrayed Obi-Wan Kenobi in George Lucas's original Star Wars trilogy; for the original 1977 film, he was nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the 50th Academy Awards.
Donald M. Ashton was an Academy Award-nominated and BAFTA-winning English art director most noted for his work on such films as Billy Budd (1962), The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), Oh! What a Lovely War (1969) and Young Winston (1972).
The 87th National Board of Review Awards, honoring the best in film for 2015, were announced on December 1, 2015.
The 88th National Board of Review Awards, honoring the best in film for 2016, were announced on November 29, 2016.
The 89th National Board of Review Awards, honoring the best in film for 2017, were announced on November 28, 2017.
The 94th National Board of Review Awards, honoring the best in film for 2022, were announced on December 8, 2022.