Saoirse Ronan recently shared her experience of not being able to escape from Steve McQueen‘s WWII drama Blitz because it’s so relevant given the current Middle East conflict.
In the movie, Ronan plays a mother looking for her son after sending him away from London during the Blitz.
During a press conference at the BFI London Film Festival, she said: “The thing that made this so real as a filming experience is that you’d shoot certain scenes where there’s total chaos and pandemonium and we’re having to portray characters in abject fear and horror, and then you would leave set and you’d turn on the radio and you’d hear exactly the same thing, and you’d put on the news and you’d see exactly the same thing,” she said.
“It was the first time I’d ever had an experience on a project where there wasn’t really an escape from it,” the Atonement star remarked.
The Outrun star said she’s “grateful” for the experience, but confused if that’s “insensitive to say.”
“I think it gave you so much motivation to continue on with the picture because, again I hate to say ‘relevant,’ but it does feel incredibly relevant,” she said. “For some reason we still haven’t been able to break this cycle. So yeah, it made it incredibly real.”
McQueen’s Blitz will hit select heaters on November 1 and then stream on Apple TV+ on November 22. Alongside Saoirse Ronan, Blitz also stars Harris Dickinson, Erin Kellyman, Stephen Graham, Kathy Burke, Paul Weller, Leigh Gill and Benjamin Clementine.