Films about addiction and recovery tend to follow a well-trodden linear trajectory – the spiralling self-destruction and the sickening plummet towards rock bottom is followed by the painstaking, piece-by-piece rebuild of a life and a self. Which is perhaps why The Outrun, with its angular, fractured structure, extended poetic longueurs and preoccupation with birdwatching, feels like a refreshingly unconventional spin on a familiar theme.
Starring an impressive Saoirse Ronan in the central role of an alcoholic who finds her path to recovery in the isolated wildlands of Orkney, and directed by German film-maker Nora Fingscheidt (best known for System Crasher, a brilliant, abrasive portrait of a troubled nine-year-old), the film is adapted, with the participation of the author, from Amy Liptrot’s addiction memoir. A film that is as much about learning to be present in the moment as it is about healing, The Outrun, at times, leans a little heavily on shots of Ronan trudging through empty fields. But the intelligence and craft of the film-making, the way Fingscheidt guides us along the emotional journey of the central character, is absorbing.
The film’s use of colour is particularly effective – at the start of the film, when Amy has returned to her family home in Orkney to dry out, the memories of her life in London seem vivid and alluring, saturated with colour and joy, as well as alcohol. Orkney, meanwhile, is shot in unpromising tones of mossy greens and subdued greys. The film’s slow reveal of the islands’ beauty is its secret weapon, as potent as the immersive, enveloping use of sound.