“Rita embodies a woman both challenged and liberated by the absence of men, who have left for the front lines,” Roisin Kiberd recently wrote in The New York Times. Played by Saoirse Ronan, Rita is the protagonist of Steve McQueen’s latest film. Set in London during W.W. II, Blitz follows a mother’s frantic search for her nine-year-old son, George (played by the newcomer Elliott Heffernan), as the city is ravaged by Nazi bombings. Taking in the suffering endured by Londoners during the Blitz, the movie more crucially spotlights the unsung heroism of working-class women, their physical and emotional labor. “It’s a very intimate film, but at the same time the scale is epic,” says McQueen, known for Widows (2018) and 12 Years a Slave (2014). Ronan, he adds, “has the ability to hold those two fields, in a way not a lot of actresses can.” —Jeanne Malle