When Colin Welland completed his first draft, the only title he could come up with was "Runners". Then, one Sunday evening he turned on BBC's religious music series Songs of Praise (1961), featuring the hymn "Jerusalem," with lyrics from a poem by William Blake. The chorus included the words "Bring me my chariot of fire". The writer leaped to his feet and shouted to his wife, "I've got it, Pat! 'Chariots of Fire'!" (The "Jerusalem" hymn is featured at the beginning and end of the movie.)
Eric Liddell was born in China, where his parents were missionaries. He returned as a missionary. During the Japanese occupation of China, he was taken into the Japanese Weihsien Internment Camp, where he died from a brain tumor just before the camp was liberated.
About six years after this movie's release, Trinity College re-enacted the quad dash with British Olympic athletes Steve Ovett and Sebastian Coe taking part. Nigel Havers agreed to act as starter. At lunch after the event, the Dean confessed it had been a great mistake not to cooperate with the making of this movie.
Producer David Puttnam arranged a screening of this movie for Eric Liddell's widow. Afterwards, she said she loved the movie, and that it fully captured her husbands character. However, she felt that the only thing they got wrong was that her husband was a much more graceful runner that was shown. Puttnam was astonished. He said the only thing they really knew about Liddell when making this movie was his running style (from newsreel films of the era). The one thing he was fully confident that they had gotten right was the only thing Mrs. Liddell felt was wrong.
Although it received a standing ovation when shown in competition at the 1981 Cannes Film Festival, this movie was mercilessly savaged by the French critics, because it called the French "the frogs" and "an unprincipled lot." In order to prevent the negative critical response from hurting its international distribution, Roger Ebert lobbied the other American critics in attendance to award it the "American Critics Prize", which they did in a 6-5 vote. This marks the only time in the sixty-year history of the festival that this award has been presented.
Colin Welland: the writer appears as the preacher alongside Eric Liddell at the Sunday church services in Paris before the games begin in earnest.