In Brooklyn a young Irish woman is sent off to New York where opportunities beckon that are not available in 1940s Ireland. Ellis played by a luminous (and past Golden Globe nominee) Saoirse Ronan lands in a city, which may as well be a different planet. She finds support in the Irish expat community but succumbs to the intense longing for home and family. Slowly she finds employment and meets a boy from another classic Brooklyn community: Italians. Through her very personal story Brooklyn, scripted by Nick Hornby from the Colm Tóibín novel, humanizes the universal immigrant experience and what every immigrant knows: what it means to be torn between two worlds. The HFPA’s Kirpi Uimonen asked Saoirse about it.

Luca Celada