Emily Blunt has spoken out against the pressures which are placed on new mothers at the premiere of her new film, The Girl On The Train.
The actress, who plays troubled alcoholic Rachel in the new adaptation of Paula Hawkins’ best-selling thriller, told The Hollywood Reporter, ‘I think there is a huge societal pressure on women when it comes to motherhood, this sort of mummy cult that goes on.’
‘I think it sort of makes women feel that they have to be a bit defensive about the choices that they make, whether they want to be a mother, whether they don’t, whether they want to breastfeed, whether they don’t,’ she added. ‘I could go on and on.’
‘In the domestic world, I think it’s when women can be a bit cruel about each other, more so than any other environment. And I think this film really captures that,’ the actress explained.
In the novel and film, Emily’s character Rachel is recently divorced, and has unsuccessfully tried to have children. While commuting into the city, she becomes obsessed with a seeming perfect couple (played by Luke Evans and Haley Bennett) whose home she passes each day. When she witnesses a disturbing incident from her train carriage, she becomes inextricably drawn into their lives – and the resulting police enquiry.
The 33-year-old actress recently gave birth to her second daughter, Violet, with her husband John Krasinski. The couple are also parents to two-year-old Hazel.
Discussing the problems of bringing a book to the big screen – and the criticism that she is ‘too pretty’ to play Rachel – Emily reasoned that ‘any time a character or certainly a book is beloved, you’re going to be met with some resistance to whoever is cast or whoever is doing it.’
‘Once we started filming it didn’t enter my mind that much,’ she added, before advising that ‘people should see the film before they decide if they think I look pretty or not.’
The Girl On The Train will be released in UK cinemas on October 5.
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