Steve McQueen praises Saoirse Ronan, Elliot Heffernan for Blitz performance

Steve McQueen has praised Blitz stars Saoirse Ronan and Elliott Heffernan for their acting in the movie.

Steve was asked in a new interview with Entertainment Weekly if personal experiences shaped the movie for him.

The 12 Years a Slave filmmaker replied: “The initial conversation with Saoirse was so beautiful because she was talking about her mother and their relationship, and the tightness of that bond. It really kind of stirred me in a way because she was very lucky to have that in contact with her mom.”

Opening up about his relationship with his own mom, he continued: “I never did. My mother was always the authority.”

“And I thought that how Saoirse pulled from that relationship into the work with Elliott was so wonderful. It was real,” he added.

When asked how he found newcomer Elliot to play George, he said: “You write something, and then you put the script down and go, ‘Okay, not bad. Oh my goodness gracious, we've got to find a kid! Does a kid like George actually exist?’ So we cast the net broad and wide.”

Praising the young star, he said: “And then Elliott's tape came in, and there was just a real stillness in him in his eyes. And it's like that kind of photograph or that image you have on a wall, where you look at that image, and you're going left, and you're going right, and you think you understand it, or even if you don't understand it, you want to understand it.”

Elsewhere, Steve revealed that he got the idea for Blitz when he saw a picture of a “boy standing on the railway station, a Black child ready to be evacuated."

"That was it, really. This innocent, cute, sweet boy in this very unstable landscape. And I wanted to know his story and see that world through his eyes,” he added.

In the film Saoirse Ronan plays mom to Elliott Heffernan’s George, a biracial young boy who tries to make his way home after he gets lost when he’s evacuated during the Blitz.