THE Outrun is a visually and auditorily stunning film. Through flashbacks, glowing colours, rhythmic techno and the backdrop of the beautiful Orkney islands, we learn the story of protagonist Rona’s rising and falling addiction to alcohol and her return home to try to stay sober.

The music is at once diegetic and non-diegetic, transferring from Rona’s headphones to the world around her and mixing with the crashing of waves and whirling of wind to give us perfect insight into her head. The filmmaking is second-to-none and Saoirse Ronan’s acting is superb.

It’s a touching and swirling narrative based on the screenwriter’s real experience and leaves you breathless, hopeful and with a bit more than a lump in your throat.

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But where the film truly shines is in its use of selkie and corncrake metaphors to give us real insight into the perspective of the main character.

The film opens with an interpretation of the selkie myth; the tale of seal people coming to land never to be perceived or else they’ll be forced to stay human forever. In traditional folklore, selkies represent renewal, transformation and personal growth. Rona is herself metaphorically a selkie; drawn away from the waters of her island home to London, where she replaces ocean water with alcohol and quickly drowns in her addiction.

Like the tale, she sheds her skin – or shakes off societal expectations – for destructive behaviours. Her grades begin to slip as she forgoes them for partying and breaks up a long-term relationship thanks to her drinking. It’s a glaring look at the horrors of alcoholism and it pulls no punches.

In returning to her island home, she tries to don the seal skin again and return to the ocean. She replaces alcohol with Coca Cola and tends to her father’s farm. But she decries her mother’s attempts to get her to go swimming. When she encounters seals, they’re distant from her as she travels around the islands in a boat. The meaning is clear: she cannot flourish in this island, no matter how much she wants to.

When Rona finally agrees to get a job at home after the idea of returning to London sends her spiralling, she’s tasked by the RSPB at tracking corncrakes. We hear them before we see them, her coworkers tell her.

Elusive yet resilient, and with an unmistakable call, the bird becomes the second metaphor of the film – but this time, they represent Rona’s search for happiness.

At the inevitable moment when all comes crashing down like the waves that surround the island, Rona’s rock bottom begins with finding not one trace of a corncrake. She returns to her father’s caravan and gives into her addiction.

Feeling like her whole world has come crumbling down, Rona migrates for the winter. Not south to Congo like the corncrakes, but north to Papay. She needs to undergo her journey of transformation solo, so she leaves her family for the tiny Rose Cottage.

On Papay, Rona finally thrives. She finds solace with a fellow recovering alcoholic, gets involved with the festivities and even has hints at a romance. And around Christmas time, she takes the leap and returns to the sea. Gasping and shaking as she walks into ice-cold water in the middle of December, she’s surrounded by the seals who call to her like they’re welcoming her back. It’s a beautiful, emotional moment of the culmination of her steps towards personal growth.

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And it’s on Papay where she finds her happiness. Like the corncrake’s penchant for hiding in weeds, walks along the beach have Rona becoming obsessed with seaweed. When her mother comes to visit her, she excitedly explains that she’s switching her PhD to one studying the benefits of the weed and seawilding. Like the resilient little bird, Rona has worked through her darkest moments and come out the other side stronger than ever.

When leaving Papay in the spring, Rona lets out a seal call, a woop, to call to her fellow seals, who pop out of the sea to see what the noise is about. But it’s a call of happiness, not despair. As she shouts, the camera pans around to show her face as she breaks into laughter.

And of course, like Rona’s shout of joy, we at last hear the croaking call of a corncrake. Like the elusive bird, she’s beaten the odds and stayed alive; like the seal, she’s undertaken this path of self-discovery and come out a changed woman.

And hopefully, like the corncrake, she’ll be resilient enough to make it through this time.