The written word can be powerful and beautiful - but films transport us to another place in a way that even the most evocative words never can.

I appreciate the written word and spoken word more, but Atonement sort of established so much of me. It was a character that didn't really speak, and I found that a lot of the roles I was gravitating toward after that were kind of nonverbal.

If you don't have eyebrows, you don't really have a face.

I think acting is something that is within you. It's a very natural thing for me. It comes from myself, really.

What we do every St. Patty's day, which is wear green and drink a lot of Guinness. And maybe cry a little bit and laugh, and everyone will have to sing a song. That's how every funeral, christening, and wedding ends up in Ireland. Everyone ends up having to sing a song by the end of it.

I know most of the photographers in Ireland. And if I don't want my photograph taken, they will leave me alone.

The 1916 uprising was kind of the most important rebellion in Ireland's fight for independence that had been going on for 700 years. So it's a very important moment in history for us.