The true story of British track stars Harold Abrahams and Eric Liddell winning gold at the 1924 Paris Olympics inspired the Oscar-winning film.
“To play the game is the only thing in life that matters” proclaimed the handbook given to British athletes competing in the 1924 Summer Olympics in Paris. The country’s two top gold-medal hopefuls, however, thought otherwise.
Faith mattered most to sprinter Eric Lidell, a devout Christian who ran to glorify God, not country. Success on the track provided him with a pulpit to evangelize about his religion. To Liddell’s fiercely competitive teammate Harold Abrahams, who ran to overcome anti-Semitism and outdo his brothers, winning was paramount. The real-life story of the two Olympic champions propelled by a higher purpose inspired the 1981 Oscar-winning film Chariots of Fire.
‘Chariots of Fire’ Resurrects Memories of 1924 Olympics
Abrahams returned from Paris with his personal gold and a silver medal as part of Great Britain’s 4×100 meter relay team. The year after his Olympic triumph, however, a broken leg suffered in a long jump forced his premature retirement. Forever tied to the Olympics, Abrahams captained the British team in the 1928 Summer Games and covered the Olympics as a journalist, author and broadcaster for 40 years.
Liddell’s athletic career waned as he joined the family business in 1925 as a missionary in Tianjin, China. He only returned to Scotland twice, becoming an ordained minister on his 1932 visit. After Japan attacked China in 1937, Tianjin fell to the Japanese after three days of bombing. As World War II turned increasingly brutal, Liddell’s pregnant wife and two girls departed for the safety of Canada. The Olympian never saw his family again. In March 1943, Liddell was confined to a Japanese-run internment camp, where the 43-year-old died of an inoperable brain tumor in 1945.
Memories of the Olympic feats of Abrahams and Liddell faded from memory until they were resurrected in the 1981 film Chariots of Fire, winner of four Oscars including the Academy Award for Best Picture. With its iconic soundtrack accompanying the scene of British Olympians running barefoot in the surf, the low-budget movie remains one of the most acclaimed sports films of all-time.
The film cemented history’s link between Abrahams and Liddell. Ryan says that the Olympians weren’t close friends but spoke glowingly of each other.
“Both men had huge respect for the achievements of the other,” he says. “The funniest thing about the dynamic between Harold and Eric is that they had identical views of the other’s running. Both thought the other man was technically terrible—but unbeatable for fighting spirit on the track.”