On two occasions in recent months, Colin Firth has met for lunch with an elderly couple from Berwick-upon-Tweed. The pair had a story to tell, one that Firth has struggled to comprehend.
In Edinburgh today the Oscar-winner spoke of his admiration for Eric Lomax, a survivor of the Burma railway, who he will play in the new film The Railway Man, alongside fellow Academy Award-winner Nicole Kidman as Lomax's wife Patti.
The film, directed by Jonathan Teplitzky, starts filming in Scotland on Monday. It is based on Lomax's book of the same name, which tells of his suffering as a young Scottish POW on the Burma railway and how, with the help of his wife, he travelled back to Asia to meet one of his torturers in an attempt let go of a lifetime of bitterness and hate.
Speaking at a press conference in the Scottish capital today alongside Kidman and co-stars Stellan Skarsgård and Jeremy Irvine (who will play the young Lomax), Firth said he had been struck by the old soldier's story and how it still has relevance today.
"Just about any era you could name could be held to be famous for its brutality and devilish tortures," said Firth. "Sadly, I can't envisage a time when it won't be relevant. I think what is not often addressed is the effect over time. We do sometimes see stories about what it's like coming home from war, we very rarely see stories about what it's like decades later. This is not just a portrait of suffering. It's about relationships… how that damage interacts with intimate relationships, with love."
Lomax, now 92, was in his early 20s when he was captured during in fall of Singapore in 1942 and was transported to Thailand to work on the notorious railway. When guards discovered a radio he had helped make to bring news to the inmates, he was interrogated and tortured.
"He was horribly punished," said producer and co-writer Andy Paterson. "You are left after that messed up for many, many years. Then decades later he got on a train and met a beautiful woman who made him laugh for the first time and she had the strength to try and find out what was happening to him."
Paterson first read Lomax's book more than 13 years ago and knew it was a film he wanted to make. "It's a story that will never let you go." He was introduced to Bill Curbishley, manager of The Who, who owned the rights to Lomax's books, but the story's epic scale and their plan to follow the structure of the book exactly was difficult to fund.
A reshaping of the story to highlight the role of Patti Lomax proved more attractive. Teplitzky was signed to the project, and the script was sent to Firth, fresh from The King's Speech, who loved it.
Firth said it was important to him that he meet Eric and Patti Lomax before he started preparing for the role. "They are both incredibly engaging," he said. "He's incredibly approachable, as much as a person can be on a subject like that. He is 92 and not really demonstrating that at all. He is mentally far more agile than I am. I have to keep up with him really. He has a tremendous sense of humour that can be a little dark at times. I found him nothing but a delight and you do feel a little overwhelmed by the enormity of the story you are trying to tell."
Kidman has yet to meet Patti Lomax, but will spend some time with her during the shoot. "I wanted to form the character first and then meet her, so I was not trying to force myself into being her," she said. "I have to find my own way."
Like Firth, Kidman had been struck by the story when she was sent the script. "I just found the subject matter very moving, that's what drew me to it and the power of somebody loving someone through trauma. I found that inspiring and I can relate to it." The day after she signed up for the film she read an article in an American newspaper about a woman falling in love with a man who had just returned from Afghanistan. "I thought, there's a sign that this is still incredibly relevant."
It is not Kidman's first visit to Scotland. She revealed at the press conference that she had visited the country as a teenager and had taken a road trip with her then boyfriend as far north as Ullapool.
The film is a joint UK and Australian production, backed by, among others, Creative Scotland and Lionsgate UK, who will be releasing the film in the UK. The 10-week shoot will move from Scotland to Thailand in late May and then Australia in early June.
Andy Paterson said there had been some qualms among the Japanese acting community when it came to casting the roles of the Japanese soldiers. "The initial reaction to a film about the Burma railway was that people were scared of it and ran away from it," he said. "But when we said it's the Railway Man, the actors turned around and said we would be honoured to be part of that story."
