Jack O’Connell draws on personal experiences for gritty drama ”71′

TORONTO – Jack O’Connell displays the scars on his knuckles when asked if he drew on personal experiences for his role as a young soldier in the film “’71.”

The marks on his skin are from tough times growing up in Derby, England.

He mined his memories to portray the character Gary Hook, a British soldier who gets left behind on the streets of Belfast in 1971, during the height of clashes between Catholic Nationalists and Protestant Loyalists known as “The Troubles.”

“I’ve had to perhaps comprehend stuff that other people haven’t had the misfortune of comprehending, but I feel very privileged that I’m here on the other side of all of that,” O’Connell said in an interview.

“I feel a certain strength because of it all. It helps me relate with Gary.”

The film follows O’Connell’s character over a long day and night through a dizzying network of Belfast streets, where it becomes increasingly difficult to determine just who is an aggressor and who is an innocent bystander.

That blurring of lines was deliberate, said first-time filmmaker Yann Demange.

“I want us to experience it like the protagonist,” Demange said.

“He turns up, he doesn’t know what the hell’s going on, he’s shocked, he’s horrified, he slowly learns little bits of information, he never gets the clear picture.”

O’Connell — known for his role in the gritty prison drama “Starred Up” and the Angelina Jolie-helmed “Unbroken” — felt his rough upbringing put him in a position to honour the character he was portraying.

“As far as I’m concerned, Gary Hook did exist,” he said.

“It’s real-life events. So then I feel a sense of duty to at least depict that because there are also people that will watch “’71” that were affected by it. And that’s where my duties lie.”

Demange said the film explores themes and emotions that could be relevant to any number of conflicts taking place in the world.

“It had that universality…. You could be talking about Afghanistan,” he said.

“It’s really about kids dying in these convoluted, dirty conflicts where no one really knows what the motives are and it’s very unclear what’s going on. I felt passionately about it.”

With such a project, however, also came a sense of responsibility, making Demange determined to keep the film true to the period it covered.

“We had to make sure it was going to be portrayed in a very measured, very considered way and to be honest.”

The film opens in Toronto and Vancouver on Friday and will be expanding across the country in the coming weeks.