David Lean's anti-war classic stars Alec Guinness as a British officer who raises the morale of his captured regiment in a PoW camp in Burma by building a bridge, but in doing so is unwittingly helping the Japanese war effort. William Holden is the American escapee who returns to destroy the bridge. A brilliantly intelligent and stirring epic with superb colour photography, it won Oscars for picture, director, actor (Guinness), script, photography and music. Guinness is tremendous but he was dubious about accepting the role, saying: 'I can't imagine anyone wanting to watch a stiff-upper-lip British colonel for two and a half hours.'

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