Career: After landing roles in off-Broadway productions, Keitel met Martin Scorsese, an up-and-coming filmmaker, who cast him in his student project before handing him the lead in Mean Streets (1973). Despite an amazing performance, it was co-star Robert De Niro who profited most. Keitel's career took something of a nosedive toward the end of the 1970s, but received a shot in the arm in 1992 thanks to the films Bad Lieutenant and Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs. This made him hot property, with Keitel going on to star in films such as The Piano (1993), Cop Land (1997), From Dusk Till Dawn (1996) and National Treasure (2004) and its 2007 sequel. He also appeared in the short-lived US version of Life On Mars. More recently, he has starred in Inglourious Basterds (2009), Little Fockers (2010), Moonrise Kingdom (2012) and The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014).

Career: Allen was in a number of Comic Strip Presents... programmes during the 1980s. He also appeared in an episode of The Young Ones and made his film debut in Crystal Gazing, which he co-wrote. Among his highest profile projects are Scandal, A Very British Coup, Carry On Columbus, The Young Americans, Shallow Grave, Trainspotting, Martin Chuzzlewit, De-Lovely, 24 Hour Party People and The Others. Allen featured in BBC reality show Art School, released football-themed single Vindaloo as part of the band Fat Les, has conducted often-controversial interviews for Channel 4, and was most recently seen playing the Sheriff of Nottingham in Robin Hood. More recently, he has starred in The Body Farm, By Any Means, and My Mad Fat Diary.

Career: After several years of theatre work, Mortensen made his first film appearance playing an Amish farmer in Peter Weir's Witness. During the 1990s, Mortensen appeared in supporting roles in a variety of films, including Jane Campion's The Portrait of a Lady and Young Guns II, as well as taking leading roles in American Yakuza and Gus Van Sant's Psycho. Mortensen's major mainstream breakthrough came in 1999, when Peter Jackson cast him as Aragorn in The Lord of the Rings film trilogy. Since then, he has scored major successes with crowd-pleasing cowboy film Hidalgo, and super-tough David Cronenberg vehicles A History of Violence and Eastern Promises. His last major film was the post-apocalyptic drama The Road.