Saoirse Ronan first entered our consciousness as Briony Tallis, the precocious but misguided young teen whose little white lie set in motion devastating events in 2007′s “Atonement.” The role earned her an Oscar nomination and instantly put her star on the map – similar to Jennifer Lawrence and Hailee Steinfeld this past year.

The Ronan we meet in “Hanna” couldn’t be any more different. Trained in the arctic wilderness by her father (Eric Bana) to be a merciless killing machine for (no spoiler alert) an uncertain future, her title character may go down as one of the fiercest female action heroes ever.

We grilled the 16-year-old Irish teen on kicking ass, missing out on “The Hunger Games” lead and (possibly) reuniting with “Lovely Bones” director Peter Jackson for a little movie called “The Hobbit.”

What was the bigger draw for you on “Hanna” – getting to work Joe Wright again, or getting to break necks with your bare hands?
Break necks obviously, clearly [laughs]. I actually came onto the project before Joe anyway so it certainly made it more exciting when he came onboard. But I was involved first and it didn’t have a director… The first person that popped into my head was Joe and I said, well why don’t you get in touch with Joe Wright? I’m sure he’ll be interested. And they were like, yeah we were thinking about that.

So he owes you one.
Definitely. He owes me big time.

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Did all that butt-kicking come naturally to you?
Yeah I think it did, to a certain extent. Of course I had to train and strengthen and things like that, but I’ve always been quite an athletic person and my dad really did karate when he was younger and he was an All-Ireland champion and stuff. I’ve always seen him do things like that… so I kind of got the movements and the energy easily enough.

Are you feeling a little tougher these days? Like you could take someone on in a dark alley if you needed to?
I certainly did when I was making the film. I’ve still got muscles from the thing. [Flexes her arm] I’ve still got a bit of tricep, which freaks me out a little bit. I think if I went back and I trained I could probably give someone a run for their money.

“Hanna” has drawn early comparisons to other movies like “Kick-Ass” and “The Professional,” where young females are drawn into the action. Do you think those are warranted?
Not really. I mean, they’re completely different. With “Kick-Ass,” yes there is a young girl in it but it’s more like a cartoon-type character. I like [Hit-Girl, played by Chloe Moretz] because she is quite tough and cool and she swears a lot. But the interesting thing about “Hanna” is that we’ve never seen an action heroine like this before, someone who is very innocent and naïve and very elegant in a ferocious type of way when she fights.

Seeing you in the wilderness with the bow and arrow made it easy to picture you as the lead character, Katniss, in the “The Hunger Games” series. I know that you were in talks for that at some point. Did those go very far?
I think every girl was going out for Katniss. I read the script and stuff. Jennifer Lawrence is doing it now so clearly they were looking for someone a bit older. I think it’s a great character for her to play, and if I had done it, it could have been too similar to “Hanna” because she is so forest-smart. She’s very comfortable in the woods and around nature… But I think Jennifer Lawrence is going to do a great job, she is a good actress. And I hope they do the book justice.

Speaking of Lawrence, how did earning an Oscar nomination change your life or your career?
It changed my career a little bit, but it didn’t change my life really at all. I met some cool people that night, I guess. It affected my career more because people were more aware of who I was, that’s certainly something an Oscar nomination is going to give you. I’ve been offered some fantastic roles since then.

It seems like there are so many good Irish actors in Hollywood but so few Irish actresses. Any insight as to why that is?
I really don’t know because we’ve got very talented actresses at home and we don’t have many Irish actresses [in Hollywood]… We need more than just me and Sara [Bolger] and I think it would be great for us to export a little bit more. I really don’t know why it is. I mean, we have Maureen O’Hara for God’s sake!

There are conflicting reports as to whether or not you’ve been cast in “The Hobbit,” are you allowed to say anything?
Not really, no. I wish I was but nothing has been confirmed yet, even though IMDb says it… I know they have introduced a few new characters into the film. And if they want me to go back to New Zealand to do “The Hobbit” then I will jump at the chance. I really love working with [Peter Jackson and crew] and just to be a part of that film, which has so much excitement built up around it. And there are so many great actors in it as well, I know ["Hanna" co-star] Cate [Blanchett] is going back. Ian McKellan is doing it, and Martin Freeman. So it’d be fun, yeah.

You made “City of Ember” with NextMovie favorite Bill Murray. Any crazy Bill Murray stories?
He had this fake stomach gut thing, because he’s supposed to be this really greedy mayor… He’s nuts, have you met him? He’s mad. He’d go around – he did it to my mom as well — he’d go around with his stomach in between takes [standing up and stretching her stomach out] and just bump into people all the time. And he really liked golf buggies, I think there’s a story of him stealing a golf buggy or something.

And getting back to “Hanna,” you worked closely with Eric Bana on this movie, was there any sort of father-daughter dynamic developed off-screen as well?
Someone told me that Eric has described our relationship as a brother-sister-type relationship and I think he’s actually right. I know that’s weird because he’s a lot older than me… well, he’s only 22, not that much older [laughs]. But yeah we got along really well and we had a lot of fun together. Eric used to be a stand-up comedian and was on a sketch show and everything in Australia, which is brilliant… he always kept me laughing.

Music is an important component of “Hanna,” with a pulsating score by The Chemical Brothers. Is that the kind of music you’re into?
I listen to everything. I love The Chemical Brothers. I got into them when we did “Hanna” because Joe used to play “Push The Button” in particular all the time. I like electro music, and I have to listen to more of it, but JUSTICE is another great band. There’s another band that’s kind of indie rock electro called Cut Copy, they’re pretty cool as well. But I listen to all sorts. I listen to rock and a little bit of pop as well.

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I’ve added the photos of Saoirse on The Today Show this morning.

Here’s the video of Saoirse and Eric Bana on The Today Show, screencaps will be up soon. screencaps have been added!

EDIT: Three more interviews added!

Thanks again to Caro for the heads up.

Saoirse Ronan is a natural-born killer.

At least, that’s what she projects as the titular character in Hanna, an action thriller in theaters Friday that challenges a child assassin to physically fight her way to the truth about her past.

But slipping out of bubblegum-pink jelly shoes to curl up in her seat on the Four Seasons patio, Ronan is all teen, no terror. Over eggs and salmon, she tells of dragging director Joe Wright to a Lady Gaga concert, grins over a new pair of Easter-egg-blue Ray Bans and quizzes her interviewer on the age American teens can drive.

“That’s so young,” muses the nearly 17-year-old, who lives in Ireland’s countryside. “Are there lots of accidents?”

As Hanna, Ronan masters far more than passing a road test. “Two hours a day in the gym and two hours a day in martial arts” prepped her for icy winter shoots in Finland and Germany opposite Eric Bana, who plays her ex-CIA agent father prepping her for an ultimate, deadly showdown with intelligence agent Marissa Wiegler (Cate Blanchett).

The film also reunites Ronan with Wright, who last directed her at age 13 to Oscar, Golden Globe and BAFTA nominations for her role as young Briony in Atonement, the child whose damning accusation drives star-crossed lovers James McAvoy and Keira Knightley apart.

In an early meeting setting up a then-directorless Hanna with the studio, it was Ronan who threw Wright’s name in the pot.

“I get Joe Wright his work now,” Ronan jokes in her upbeat Irish lilt. “Maybe a week later Joe rang me when I was back in Ireland and told me to get my trainers on and to get in the gym.”

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“It’s all her fault,” confirms Wright, who describes her as preternaturally talented. “I was intrigued to see what had become of her and work with her again.”

Subzero temperatures made fight scenes in Finland grueling. “I’d never shot in conditions like that before,” says Bana, adding that he and Ronan eyed the crew’s Gore-tex jackets with a measure of jealousy while clad in their characters’ fur pelts. “You really have to hop to a little tent that had a heater to stop getting hypothermia,” he says. “For her to pull it off in the way that she did it was really incredible.”

Today in sunny L.A., Ronan gives a mischievous grin, admitting that while she had no problem charging Bana at full speed across a frozen lake, she skipped the mandated muscle-building whey protein powder. “It is disgusting,” she grimaces, glancing at her slender arms, no longer rippled with Hanna’s muscled sinew. “I wasn’t into having muscles,” she says. “I like to look like a girl.”

Bubbly and witty in person, Ronan gave a searing performance that brings to mind the kind of Jodi Foster-like chops and focus her peers would kill for. And after attending the Oscars so young, Ronan says she’d like to go back again, “not necessarily to be nominated but just to go there and really appreciate it,” she says.

Home-schooled (“It’s just easier,” she says) in County Carlow, Ireland, the only child of Monica and actor Peter Ronan (The Devil’s Own) is determined to go to college. “It’s wonderful being on a film set, but essentially you’re pretending to be someone else for like half the time,” says Ronan, who wants to study art history.

“So to go to a place for like, two years when you’re at a really impressionable age and figure out who you actually are, I think that’s just something that I definitely want to do.”

Ronan, who last made a splash in Peter Jackson’s chilling adaptation of The Lovely Bones, acknowledges she’s done “a lot of drama,” but “it’s just kind of the way it’s worked out.” Repeat business with famed directors seems to be her wheelhouse, and while “nothing’s definite” that she’ll play an elf in Jackson’s upcoming epic, The Hobbit, she loves his New Zealand setup, where she shot Bones. “It’s so separate from Hollywood,” says Ronan. “He’s got an entire crew that works with him on everything that he does, and it really, really feels like a family.”

Next, Ronan tries on lighter fare with black comedy Violet & Daisy opposite Alexis Bledel, due this year, and she has an eye out for a clever teen comedy, “like, say, Juno or, back in the day, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.”

“The films that I’ve read have geeks in them and misfits and weirdos and messed-up teenagers,” says Ronan, ladylike in her Miu Miu frock. With a turn of the wrist, she reveals a design inked with TopShop tattoo pens. “It’s great because that’s the way teenagers are.”

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Thanks to M for the heads up.

“I don’t know if I’m good or whatever,” says “Hanna” star Saoirse Ronan, “but acting itself is just something that I do, and it’s a very natural thing for me to do, or has been so far.”

You can say that again. A week away from turning 17, the Irish actress (her first name is pronounced “ser-sha”) already is stunningly good. She was nominated for an Oscar for her role in “Atonement” and earned wide praise for her work in the otherwise mediocre “The Lovely Bones.” On screen, Ronan displays rare maturity and depth; in conversation by phone from New York, she’s more energetic and quick-witted than plenty of people twice her age who I’ve interviewed.

In “Hanna,” opening Friday, a different sort of rapid-fire aim makes her 16-year-old character deadly. Hanna has been kept away from society all her life, and trained by her ex-CIA agent father (Eric Bana) to be an assassin. As Hanna breaks away from her father to see the world and kill an operative (Cate Blanchett) targeting her, she learns about basic societal standards such as TV and air travel. That’s when the action movie from director Joe Wright (“Atonement”) becomes remarkably thrilling and cool.

Ronan, who lives about two hours outside Dublin, still can’t/won’t officially confirm her starring role in Peter Jackson’s upcoming “The Hobbit” films, nor rumors about starring in Wright’s possible “Anna Karenina” adaptation. At the least, it was announced this week that Lily Collins (“The Blind Side”), not Ronan as many believed, will star in “The Brothers Grimm: Snow White,” so that’s one rumor off the table.

Who is scarier: Hanna or the girls on “My Super Sweet 16”?
[Laughs.] Overall, the “Super Sweet 16” girls, until they get their Ferrari. When they get their Ferrari, they’re happy. But before that, there’s a lot of pressure. Jeez, I know. Being 16 is a very big deal. [Laughs.] I was actually working in Berlin on my 16th birthday. It was very sweet. But I’m sure if those girls were put in [Germany] on their 16th birthday, they probably wouldn’t be too happy about it. That would be pretty scary.

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As you have more exposure and do more interviews, are people uniformly pronouncing your name correctly, or do they still get it wrong?
No, actually, most people are getting it right now, which, honestly, is the best feeling in the world. I mean, I know it is a difficult name, but it is kind of annoying when people mispronounce it.

And after people see “Hanna,” they’ll be afraid to get it wrong because they’ll know what you can do to them.
I reckon so. Maybe they’ll just call me “Hey you,” instead, just in case. Because I’ll kick their ass otherwise. Clearly.

People are calling “Hanna” the next Jason Bourne. How would she fare in a fight against him?
Oh, she’d kick his ass. [Laughs.] I don’t know. I mean, she’s got all the weapons training. I actually haven’t seen the Jason Bourne movies in ages but she has got plenty of skills and she was actually born to kill.

Then why wasn’t “Hanna” just called “Bourne to Kill”?
Wasn’t that a really clever thing to come up with? You and I did that right there. We should get onto the producers and ask them to change it.

For franchise recognition.
Just turn around the whole campaign and start all over again. And maybe I can have Matt Damon with me wherever I go and we can do all of our press together. That would be fun.

You did a ton of training for “Hanna.” What’s the most memorable moment that you haven’t gotten to talk about before?
Huh. I haven’t been asked that, actually. Of the training, you mean? Well, I did these ab crunch things. I don’t know if you go to the gym but you sit in a seat, it’s sort of a like a roller-coaster ride seat and you put the thing down over your shoulders to protect you, and then you bend over and you bring your knees up so you’re crunching your abs and they did about 60 of those and I was pretty [impressed] with myself.

How much weight was on the machine?
Um, that’s a good question. I think it was, it wasn’t that much, maybe 15 or something.

Sixty reps is still impressive.
Thank you, I think it is. Don’t put in what weight it was, though, because then people can think it was like 30. And it’ll sound more impressive. It was impressive for me, all right? I’m not Arnold Schwarzenegger here, so I gotta make do with what I have.

So much of “Hanna” is about her being exposed to the world for the first time. If you were discovering society for the first time, what would blow your mind the most?
I think the Internet is pretty mind-blowing actually. The Internet is pretty amazing, and if you’ve gone from having none of that kind of stuff, that’d be pretty interesting. I think everything would. I’m looking out my window right now and there’s like five-story red brick buildings, and I reckon if you came from a forest or something like that, that would also be pretty fascinating. So kind of everything, really.

What would Hanna do on the Internet if she had time to mess around?
Um, she’d probably make up some rumor about Jason Bourne on IMDB or something like that. It would certainly raise her profile and give her a bit more street cred if Jason was out of the way.

The motto of “Hanna” is “adapt or die.” Can that approach be applied to a movie career?
Yeah, I guess. I guess it’s different for everyone. Certain actors play the same role every time and they have a great career. [Laughs.] But I guess when it comes to fame and things like that it’s certainly something that you have to adapt to or at least accept for what it is.

What’s something you still want to do that you haven’t done yet?
I’d quite like to play an Irish girl. I’d really like to do that. I’ve never played someone Irish in a film. I’d just like to make something in Ireland, really, that’d be fun. I haven’t done that yet. Well I shot up in Belfast but I’d like to shoot something in Dublin or around in the country or something like that.

If you do star in “The Hobbit,” can you say something you’d be looking forward to or hope happens with the movie?
If I was hired to be in “The Hobbit,” I would certainly not be playing a Hobbit. I won’t have hairy feet. I don’t like hairy feet, and so I’m not going to play someone with hairy feet. I don’t know, we’ll wait and see. They’re pretty much taking everyone back from “Lord of the Rings” and sticking them into “The Hobbit” for a little while, which is so great. I think Cate’s going back down and Orlando [Bloom] I think is going back down as well, so it’s fun. It’ll be a great reuniting party when we’re—when they’re all together.

Will you be scared of Gollum?
No, I’d quite like to give him a hug, actually. I really like Gollum; I think he’d like me too.

Why?
I like him because he’s not afraid of speaking his opinion, you know? He isn’t shy about his feelings; he will always let the ring know that that is the most important thing to him. I like that; I like that in a guy. And I think he’d like me because I appreciate him. This is ridiculous. I’m just talking really silly now.

So if the most important thing in a guy’s life is his Xbox, you’d appreciate knowing that up front?
Yeah, but I don’t think I would want to be with someone like that. [Laughs.] A ring is a different thing. I don’t mean wedding ring! I just mean the “Lord of the Rings” rings.

Plus
Her moose-hunting experience pre-”Hanna”: “I didn’t have much. I wouldn’t really want to, to be honest. The fact that they can look at you before you kill them, I don’t like.”
On the upcoming “Violet and Daisy,” in which she plays another assassin: “I remember having a meeting with Geoffrey Fletcher, who directed ‘Violet and Daisy,’ and I told him just my concern of playing an assassin twice in one year, you know? But I can promise you that ‘Violet and Daisy’ is very, very different to ‘Hanna.’ It’s a black comedy and Daisy is definitely not a killer at all, so it was fine. The only similarity really between the two is they both hold guns.”
Her favorite Bill Murray movie, with whom she starred in “City of Ember”: “Well, this isn’t my favorite one, but I saw him in something, I think it was ‘Get Smart,’ about two years ago, and he was in a tree [laughs] and he was this really depressed man who didn’t have a family or anything and he lived in a tree, and I found that hilarious.”
Something people would be surprised to learn about him: “He seems to have an infatuation with golf buggies. And he steals them when he’s on set.”

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Teenage Irish actress Saoirse Ronan is making a big name for herself in Hollywood.

In the process, she’s also being swept into the rumour mill, which includes the one that had her playing Snow White opposite Julia Roberts’s evil queen. That turned out not to be true.

But the 16-year-old is close to signing to play Itaril in the two-part Peter Jackson Hobbit movie. That means she’ll reunite with her Lovely Bones director to play the slinky elf dedicated to protecting the Elf King of Mirkwood.

That’s show business, as the Oscar-nominated actress is slowly finding out.

“Plenty of rumours going around,” says the smiling Ronan at a Beverly Hills hotel. “I love the rumours.”

Gossip aside, the actress also reunites with Atonement director Joe Wright for her first action film, Hanna, which opens Friday.

In the movie, she plays the title character, a teen who has been raised in an isolated part of Finland by her ex-CIA agent father (Eric Bana) to become a lethal assassin.

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When her father sends her out on a dangerous mission to eliminate a ruthless operative (Cate Blanchett), Hanna must face off with a series of highly trained killers, and face up to some unexpected questions about who she is and what she has become.

“Hanna’s very layered, yet quite simple in her outlook on life, but quite a complicated character to play,” says Ronan. “She’s been through a lot, and she’s had to deal with a lot, yet she doesn’t over-emote, ever.”

In a way, “her journey kind of mirrors what a teenager goes through, as well, which is breaking away from the comfort of your family life, and your parents, and discovering the world for yourself.”

Certainly, Ronan discovered a few things about her own potential, while preparing for the role.

Before filming started, she trained for a couple of months in L. A., then outside Dublin, where she lives with her parents. Two hours a day of martial-arts workouts were followed by another two hours of cardio training.

“And we did stick-fighting, which I loved to do, although I’ve heard it is quite a complicated thing.”

As far as Ronan is concerned, the effort paid off in a convincing way.

“Well, Hanna’s certainly about women’s empowerment,” says the actress. “Throughout her journey, I don’t really think that Hanna changes that much. But she realizes that the world is not a fairy tale. It’s tough. And it’s ugly, in some ways.”

Indeed, Ronan doesn’t seem like a first choice for a part in an action flick, but Wright knew her range after working with her as an inexperienced but naturally gifted 12-year-old performer on Atonement.

“Joe had, and has, a belief in me, which I can really feel when I work with him,” maintains Ronan. “And that’s fantastic to know — that your director truly believes you can do what you’re attempting.”

She began acting as adolescent, first in an Irish TV public-service spot and then in shows, The Clinic and Proof.

A few years later, it was her riveting portrayal in Wright’s Atonement that earned her a supporting actress Oscar nomination and a bright future, as she held her own against Keira Knightley and James McAvoy in the picture.

In 2008, Ronan was featured in Death Defying Acts opposite Catherine Zeta-Jones and City of Ember. Both movies received mediocre reviews and fizzled at the box office. She rebounded with her starring role in the 2009 Jackson film version of Alice Sebold’s bestselling novel, The Lovely Bones.

And yes, she’s looking forward to a potential reunion with Jackson if she returns to New Zealand for The Hobbit. It will be released in two parts in 2012 and 2013.

“I know they are introducing lots of new characters into the film that aren’t in the book,” Ronan says, referring to the J.R.R. Tolkien novel.

It’s always a good sign when a director rehires an actor for a job, but it’s Ronan who says she feels like the fortunate one.

“I feel very, very lucky,” she confesses. “I really do. I think it’s amazing that there are brilliant directors out there who want me. I even get shocked when they know who I am.”

All things considered, she’s making a smooth transition from adolescent to young adult.

“Well, I don’t feel like I’m a woman. Definitely not. But I do feel like I’m a full-on teenager now. I’m not 14 anymore. No messing around. ”

And no, she won’t be moving from her country home near Dublin to Los Angeles anytime soon.

“I’m back and forth,” she says. “It varies, to be honest.”

Either way, she’s home-schooled, so she’s flexible, and is thrilled to be at her family’s country house, or on set, or promoting her latest film.

“I mean, I’m just a happy person, most of the time,” Ronan says. “And I have a great family. My mom and dad travel around with me, and they’re both parts of my life that I enjoy.”

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Thanks to Caro for the tip.

The child actor we saw in Atonement is growing up, celebrating her Sweet 16 while shooting Hanna, where she plays a girl who has known no one but her father who has trained her to be an assassin and sends her across Europe on a mission. After her chilling performance in The Lovely Bones, Saoirse takes on this action role, performing most of her own stunts. She sat down with Buzzine to talk about shooting in freezing weather in Finland, the possibility of a role for her in the forthcoming Hobbit production, and the arsenal of weapons she knows how to use.

Izumi Hasegawa: [Sarcastic] Welcome to a bright and sunny Los Angeles day.
Saoirse Ronan: I know. It’s awful. It’s been so miserable since I came over here, and I was getting away from Ireland and I thought, “Oh, I’m going to have lovely weather when I come over here.” Now that didn’t happen. Oh well.

IH: Will your archery training come in handy for working on your next movie, The Hobbit?
SR: I’m not confirmed to do The Hobbit yet. If I did get a part, I’m sure it would come in handy because a lot of the characters in that film live in the woods and have makeshift weapons and things like that. So yeah, it probably would. We’ll see if that happens.

IH: What was your training like? How long did it take you?
SR: I trained for a couple of months before I started, and I would do about two hours a day in the gym. I’d work out, and I’d do weightlifting and treadmills and benchpressing and things like that. Lovely, lovely things that I want to carry on with. I did martial arts as well for about two hours in the evening. So I’d workout for about 4-1/2 to 5 hours a day for a few months.

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IH: Your character knows a lot of facts about the world but is kind of experiencing everything for the first time. What was that like for you, getting into that head space?
SR: For her to experience everything for the first time? I kind of thought of Hanna’s mind…although in some ways it was very well-developed, she’s kind of like a baby. She’s stepping out into the world, and although she’s right about all these things and knows all these facts and is fluent in all these languages, she doesn’t really know about life. I think she’s just constantly in a state of shock and excitement and awe and fascination the whole time throughout her journey. One thing I find really interesting about Hanna is that she’s only grown up with her father. That’s the only person she’s had for her company. She’s never really been in the company of a female, so when she encounters Rachel and Sophie, who are members of the family that she stays with for a while, she’s fascinated by them and she falls in love with the idea of a more well-developed version of her own gender, I guess. So I really liked that about Hanna.

IH: Growing up, had you always wanted, as an actor, to play a kickass heroine?
SR: It wasn’t really something I thought about, to be honest. I’ve always been quite an active person, especially when I was younger. When I was in primary school, I used to play lots of sports. I was a sprinter, and I did basketball and swimming and Gaelic football and things like that. So I always thought, I guess, that it would be fun to incorporate that much physical activity and work into a dramatic piece. That’s kind of what this film turned out to be. I thought it was simply just going to be an action film, but it ended up being very layered, so it was nice to have both and work with both.

IH: Which of the skills you learned will be most useful in real life?
SR: Oh, I don’t know. I mean, I use them all. I’ve got my Lugar at home. I didn’t bring it away with me, but … well, not the sticks really. When am I ever going to stick-fight anyone? Although it is fun. Well, guns always come in handy–not in real life. I don’t use guns. But I did a film since then, and I did use guns for that. I kind of knew what to expect and I knew how to handle a gun, and I know right now you’re supposed to put it down when you’re not using it–basic things like that. So I guess that would come in pretty handy.

IH: How was it shooting in Finland? Was it as cold as it looked in that forest?
SR: It was colder. One day, I think it was around -30 degrees Celsius, and that’s very cold. The crew was complaining that it was freezing, except for the Finnish crew. They were used to it. And they all had their big puffer jackets on, and their snow boots and their gloves and their hats and things like that. Eric [Bana] and I, the whole time we were there, had a bit of deer fur around our bodies, fingerless gloves that were made out of cloth or something, and that was about it. So it was difficult to fight in that, and your muscles don’t work properly. But it’s beautiful, and I think that shows on screen. It’s such an enchanting place to be. It sort of feels like you’re in a winter wonderland.

IH: Just in terms of the elements, was this a more difficult shoot than The Way Back?
SR: I guess. We went back to Morocco for Hanna as well. It was my second time going back to exactly the same place, which was bizarre. I didn’t think I’d be going back to Ouarzazate so quickly. But I felt like the first time I went on The Way Back, my body just got a shock from the intense heat that we had to deal with every day, and it really was a big, big shock for me. I felt like the second time when I went back, it wasn’t as bad, so it was only really the cold I had to contend with. I started to feel like the first time hit me harder. The Way Back was harder.

IH: You did a number of stunts. Were there any stunts that you wanted to take on or others that you did not?
SR: No, I liked doing the stunts, as long as I was safe and padded up and harnessed and things like that, I was fine. We had a fantastic stunt coordination team. We really, really did. Jeff Imada was the head of the whole thing. He’s done all the Bourne movies and he’s done about 400 projects in his life so far. Really that was one of the best parts of the film for me, because they kept me so safe and always made me feel like I was safe, and I felt like I was capable of doing whatever Joe needed me to do for the film.

IH: What is it about emotionally interesting, different roles? There are a lot of actors your age that are not taking on the challenges you’re taking on. What is it that attracts you to these types of characters and roles, and what do you look forward to be able to do with them?
SR: They’re very interesting. It’s sort of an impulse thing, I think, when I read a script. I’ll just know from reading it whether it’s a character that I’ve fallen in love with, and if somebody else gets to do it, I’ll feel awful about it. But if they get it, it’s fine. I like to play characters that are different from me, and most of the characters that I’ve played have been entirely different from me. That’s it really. I think I like to try things that are different, things that are interesting for me, and simply a character that I’ve just fallen in love with really. And when I can’t get the character out of my head and I’m in my bedroom and I start to actually act out the scenes that I’ve read in a script, I think, “Okay, I really want to do this.”

IH: If you do get to do The Hobbit, what do you love about Itaril?
SR: [Laughs] Sneaky, sneaky. I haven’t read the script, and the character that you speak of is not in the book.

IH: Oh good, because I didn’t remember it…
SR: No, she’s not in the book, so I don’t know. But they’ll make something interesting out of her, I’m sure.

IH: We saw that you had a special birthday while you were shooting. Americans call it Sweet 16.
SR: It’s so sweet! I spent my Sweet 16 in Berlin in a housing estate. I don’t know. I think it was near Leipzig or something. It was very glamorous.

IH: How did you celebrate?
SR: The day of my 16th birthday, I was working, and I remember the scene as well. It was when I was in my grandmother’s apartment. Katrin is the grandmother’s name. And Eric and I have a fight, and I jump out the window and do all that stuff. So it was lovely. But my birthday celebration was going to see Lady Gaga. I’m a massive fan. When she was in Berlin… I’m obsessed with this girl, and it was my first time going to see her, and I actually took Joe Wright to go see her. I don’t know if you’ve met Joe already, but he doesn’t seem like a Little Monster. He actually invited himself. We were in the pit of the O2 Arena in Berlin. There were all these people dressed up, gay guys everywhere, everyone was going crazy. We were all loving Gaga, and I turned around every now and again, and every single time, Joe would just have his hands crossed like this, staring at the screen like a granddad, kind of bopping his head. It was very funny.

IH: What was it like reuniting with Joe [Wright] after Atonement?
SR: It was fantastic. The relationship we had on Atonement kind of followed through into Hanna and just developed even more so. I suppose like getting to know a friend better, really. Professionally, we got to know each other and understand each other even more, and on a personal level as well, which was nice. It felt more like a collaboration on this film, and it was something that I really felt like we were doing together. It was a new direction for both of us. So we were taking a risk by doing this, and it was exciting to share that with someone who I’d gotten on so well with four years prior.

IH: What was your favorite and least favorite part of the character of Hanna?
SR: My favorite part is that she realizes she loves music. And my least favorite part is she doesn’t kiss the Spanish guy. She throws him to the ground. I don’t know. I’m just going to say that. I don’t really have a least favorite part. But I didn’t agree with her doing that. He was cute.

IH: You said you were looking for a character that is opposite of you. Who is Saoirse? How would you define yourself? We see you through each character you play, but you say you’re looking for a character that is different from yourself. So who are you?
SR: Who am I? That could take a while then. I’m a 16-year-old Irish girl who was born in New York and is also very proud to be American. I love both countries. I love music. Acting is a great love of mine. I love Lady Gaga and David Bowie, and Fiji Water is the purest water there is, in my opinion.

IH: Do you speak other languages as well?
SR: I should really learn the language properly, I think. I’d like to learn French maybe, or Italian.

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