‘Chariots of Fire’ Producer David Puttnam to Be Honored by Rome Film Festival With Industry Lifetime Achievement Award

British producer David Puttnam, whose long list of credits includes “Chariots of Fire,” “The Killing Fields” and “The Mission,” will be honored by the Rome Film Festival with its inaugural Industry Lifetime Achievement Award.

Puttnam, whose work has earned a combined total of 10 Oscars, 10 Golden Globes, 25 BAFTAs and nine Emmys — as well as one Palme d’Or (for “The Mission”) — will receive the prize from Britain-based Italian director and screenwriter Uberto Pasolini (“Full Monte”), who began his career with Puttnam as a location scout on “Killing Fields.”

Puttnam, who is 84, started producing movies in his native London during the early 1970s and has worked with directors such as Alan Parker, Ken Russell, Adrian Lyne and Ridley Scott, among others, shepherding some of the most critically acclaimed and often commercially successful films of the 1980s.

In 1986, Puttnam moved to the U.S. to become CEO of Columbia Pictures and resigned 16 months later after green-lighting relatively low-budget films, such as John Boorman’s “Hope and Glory” and Spike Lee’s “School Daze,” rather than blockbusters. Back in the U.K., he continued to produce indie auteur cinema such as István Szabó’s “Meeting Venus” (1991) starring Glenn Close.

Puttnam ended his film career in 1997, at 56, and transitioned to politics. He was elected to Britain’s House of Lords in 1997. He retired from Parliament in 2021 but remains active in education through Atticus Education, which provides audiovisual seminars worldwide.

Puttnam has held leadership roles with the U.K.’s Film Distributors’ Association and the National Film and Television School. He also serves as a UNICEF U.K. ambassador, WWF global ambassador and is an associate professor at University College Cork.

The Rome Film Festival’s 20th edition will run Oct. 15–26.