Saoirse Ronan gives award-worthy performance in ‘The Outrun’

Saoirse Ronan had been getting up at dawn to observe local farmers in Orkney in action, soaking in as much as she could. But soon it was her turn. Not only would she have a life in her hands: She had to look like she’d been doing it her whole life. She was terrified. It wouldn’t be the last time Ronan, 30, would have to step out of her comfort zone to make the “The Outrun” (in theatres on Friday), a harrowing and transcendent portrait of addiction and recovery which she produced alongside her husband, actor Jack Lowden. She’d yell and scream and say the meanest things she could think of to her fellow actors. She’d go from euphoric to inconsolable on a dime in a chaotic, drunken haze. And she’d plough the despairing depths of a very sick person about to relapse.

But after 20 years of acting, these were challenge she was ready for.

There’s a reason her performance, defining and distinctive on a resume full of memorable characters, from Briony Tallis to Lady Bird, has garnered comparisons to Gena Rowlands in “A Woman Under the Influence.” It was Lowden who put Amy Liptrot’s bestselling memoir in her hands during the pandemic, thinking it might be an interesting role for her.

“We tend to be drawn towards the same kind of material,” Ronan said in a recent interview with The Associated Press. “I trust his taste and opinion. I kind of hold it higher than anyone else’s.” They were both at a point where they felt like they had more to give to the movies than just performing. They wanted more responsibility, more agency to help shape the material that they loved so much. And so, Ronan and Lowden set off on a journey to make “The Outrun” together. Producing, she said, made her fall in love with filmmaking even more.

“It only made the experience as an actor even richer,” Ronan said. “I had history with every single decision that had been made. I was a part of it and there was a piece of me in those decisions.” One of the first decisions that Liptrot, Ronan and German filmmaker Nora Fingscheidt made was to come up with a new name for Amy to create some healthy distance from their real life subject. They decided on Rona, after an uninhabited island visible from the Liptrot’s real farm.

The production would involve an extensive pre-shoot on the Orkney Islands, on a remote corner of Scotland, to get the full scope of its natural splendor across a year, including lambs being born and birds nesting. The film skips around between her childhood, her downfall in London and her return to Orkney, with sublime asides about the history of the place, the folklore and what’s going on in Rona’s head. She finishes the odyssey in isolation on the even smaller island of Papay. “We wanted to create a poetic film where the images and atmosphere stay with you for a long time,” wrote director Fingscheidt.

Associated Press