Running all the way to the Oscars

Chariots of Fire was a golden moment, full of promise for the British film industry and all those involved. In many ways, it was the quintessential British film: a movie about amateurism and religion, a wistful hearkening for a greener England. Directed by Hugh Hudson, it was exactly 20 years ago that it competed against Warren Beatty's Reds, Spielberg's Raiders of the Lost Ark and Mark Rydell's On Golden Pond for Best Picture, taking home four Oscars out of seven and ranking with the top British films of all time. It was a moment at which a splendid array of national talent came together.

"Serendipity," explains Hudson at a Chariots reunion in the Parisian Chophouse in London. It's an emotional night; many haven't seen each other in years. Several members of the team are absent (Oscar-winner Colin Welland and Ian Holm), while others have since died. So what happened to the famous class of '82?

Did those hopes and dreams flourish? Some peaked; for others, it was only the start of great things: two unknown Cambridge undergraduates, Stephen Fry and Kenneth Branagh, were extras; so was walk-on RSC actress Ruby Wax.

Ben Cross, who played Jewish athlete Harold Abrahams, went to Los Angeles, while Nigel Havers remained in England, a decision he half regrets. "You have to be there," he muses. In the half he doesn't regret there was A Passage to India and Empire of the Sun. "I suppose none were the hits they should have been."

His Hollywood "break" was meant to be Farewell to the King with Nick Nolte. "I was working with [Claude] Chabrol in Tuscany and couldn't make the premiere. I remember reading terrible reviews in next day's paper." He is currently starring in the successful BBC series Manchild, and has just finished a run of Art with fellow Charioteer Richard Griffiths.

For Hudson, Chariots was a very personal film that "played to my beliefs and also to my background". Like Havers, he remained in England, where he directed and produced Greystoke, another anti-Establishment movie, with Sir Ralph Richardson, and in 1985 Revolution (Al Pacino), shot with hand-held cameras. "Flawed, but my most interesting and daring film," he says.

Though praised by some (Martin Scorsese, Oliver Stone and Sean Penn), it bombed commercially, putting his feature-film career on hold. "It was a forced break, but one can't always work at full tilt."

Hudson stuck to documentaries and recharged his batteries. In 1999, he teamed up again with David Puttnam for My Life So Far (Malcolm McDowell, Colin Firth), a delightful story told through the eyes of a child, set in a Scottish castle in the Thirties. Unfortunately, due to a lethargic Miramax, it went largely unnoticed. He is now in pre-production on a major project, to start in the autumn.

For Puttnam, Chariots was a defining moment, "a way of explaining to myself why I was in the industry; this was the type of film that made me want to go into cinema in the first place". Further successes - The Killing Fields, Local Hero and culminating with a Palme d'Or for The Mission - landed him in Hollywood as the first Englishman to head Columbia studios. He stayed less than two years. "I went there knowing I shouldn't have gone, and set about proving it to myself."

Back home, among other films were Memphis Belle and War of the Buttons. He has now turned his back on film. "Politically, I was packed and ready; had we won the 1992 General Election, I would have left before. When we won in 1997, it was something I'd been wanting to do for years." Now a peer, he spends his time on matters of education.