‘The Outrun’: Saoirse Ronan Soars Magnificently in Nora Fingscheidt’s Poetic Addiction Drama

Sandra Miska

In her first feature as a producer, Saoirse Ronan delivers an exceptionally nuanced performance as a recovering alcoholic in Nora Fingscheidt’s stirring addiction drama, “The Outrun.” Ronan stars as Rona, a 29-year-old woman who returns home to the Orkney Islands, a sparsely-populated archipelago on the edge of Scotland, following a decade in London and a stint in rehab. What is meant to be a brief sojourn turns into a transformative healing journey against a breathtaking coastal backdrop.

About 90 days prior to Rona’s arrival to Orkney, she hits rock bottom after refusing to leave a bar after closing time. Following her release from a treatment program, she goes to stay with her born-again Christian mother, Annie (Saskia Reeves), while applying for jobs online and making plans to restart her life in London. She also spends time with her father, Andrew (Stephen Dillane), whose bipolar disorder and own addictions led to his and Annie’s divorce. Friendless in the beginning, there is little opportunity for Rona to resume her partying, but the flipside to that is that she has lots of time to ruminate about her troubled past, and being around her folks causes memories of her dysfunctional childhood to resurface.

“The Outrun” is based on Amy Liptrot’s best-selling memoir of the same name, who co-wrote the screenplay with director Nora Fingscheidt. In this film, the choice was made to have the fictional character, Rona, take the place of Liptrot. Fingscheidt told Entertainment Voice that this decision created some “healthy distance” for Liptrot, Ronan and herself.

“[Rona’s] an inspiration of Amy, but not an imitation of Amy, because it’s just a movie. It can never capture the complexity of how things really were and what was connected with what, you know? So, it’s clear you need to simplify and dramatize and make things more concise in order to work in two hours.”

Although Rona has a master’s degree in biology and is studying for her PhD, she has trouble finding work. After circumstances cause her to abandon her return to London for the foreseeable future, she accepts a volunteer position with the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB), tracking an endangered species of bird, the corncake. On paper, this sounds extremely boring, but proves to be game-changing for Rona, as it allows her to get out and meet people not in her mom’s bible study, as well as provide a wholesome distraction. .But the most drastic change comes when she decides to leave Annie’s and head to a rental on the remote island of Papay for the winter.

Orkney is a character in itself in “The Outrun,” as Fingscheidt shot on location, capturing the magnificent landscapes that shaped and continue to shape Rona. According to the director, shooting in Orkney came with a lot of challenges, including a lack of lodging options, but was worth it in the end, as it brought everyone involved closer together and created an authenticity the film would not have had otherwise.

“We all grew together as a family. That was really lovely, to feel so welcomed and embraced by the community. And we had so many Orcadians in front of the camera, people who have never acted before, behind the camera; they recreated their local events for us.”

Because so much of what Rona goes through is internal, Ronan and Fingscheidt had to get creative when it came to capturing her journey. In dreamy voice overs, she tells of the mythology of Orkney, but one gets even more out of scenes of her walking around outdoors, sometimes with headphones blaring electronic music she once danced to in London clubs. Eventually, she takes off the headphones and surrenders herself to the nature all around her. But has she really turned over a new leaf, or is she just passing the time with less destructive addictions?

“It’s a story about the inheritance of mental illness,” said Fingscheidt. “It’s about reconnecting with that place that you come from, but that you sort of ran away from. It is about somebody who almost exchanges one addiction to the other, the way she immerses herself into  researching scientific facts, seaweed, mythology, birdsong. It’s quite obsessive.”

Obsessive, maybe, but Rona’s new hobbies distract her somewhat from being consumed by thoughts of her past. Although he never sets foot in Orkney, Daynin (Paapa Essiedu) is one of the most important characters here. Through flashbacks, the story is told of her passionate and tumultuous relationship with this great love of hers. Impressively, Ronan, Essiedu and Fingscheidt managed to tell this ill-fated love story effectively in just five scenes. Fingscheidt recalled that two actors had such a “magical chemistry” that when it came time for the breakup, Ronan walked away feeling like she had really been broken up with.

The most important relationship in Rona’s life, the one she needs to examine in order to properly heal, is her relationship with her parents, particularly with her mother. She has a lot of history with Annie and Andrew, and Ronan’s connection with Reeves and Dillane comes across as very natural. How Fingscheidt directed the trio through improvised scenes before filming enhanced what the camera captured.

“There is not one scene in the film where you have Rona with both parents. But, interestingly, we did quite a bit of rehearsal, [and explored] how life was at home, when they were still together, in order to understand what is the dynamic in this triangle,” revealed Fingscheidt.

Ronan gives one-hundred percent of herself here, and the natural surroundings amplify her stunning performance, leading to what is an overall memorizing cinematic experience. She and the filmmakers took what could have been another story about addiction and created something truly memorable.

“The Outrun” releases Oct. 4 in theaters nationwide.