The English Patient (film) Best Supporting Actress for Juliette Binoche. Ralph Fiennes, playing the titular character, and Kristin Scott Thomas were Oscar-nominated for their performances. The film also won five BAFTA Awards and two Golden Globes. The British Film Institute ranked "The English Patient" the 55th greatest British film of the 20th century. In the final days of the Italian Campaign of World War II, Hana, a French-Canadian nurse of the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps, obtains permission from her unit to move into a bombed-out Italian monastery, to look after a dying, critically burned man who speaks English but cannot remember his name.
The English Patient (film) with a passing army truck, and she hugs Almásy's book to herself as she rides away. Saul Zaentz was interested in working with Anthony Minghella after he saw the director's film "Truly, Madly, Deeply" (1990); Minghella brought this project to the producer's attention. Michael Ondaatje, the Sri Lankan-born Canadian author of the novel, worked closely with the filmmakers. During the development of the project with 20th Century Fox, according to Minghella, the "studio wanted the insurance policy of so-called bigger" actors. Zaentz recalled, "they'd look at you and say, 'Could we cast Demi Moore in the role'?" Not until Miramax