Danny Boyle says Ink team had a 'siege mentality' making film about The Sun

Danny Boyle says his film about the rise of The Sun was so hard to finance that the team worked with a siege mentality.

The Oscar-winning director was speaking at Deadline's Contenders Film: London event at the Ham Yard Hotel on Saturday 10 October 2026, where he appeared alongside writer James Graham and star Jack O'Connell.

Boyle said raising money for Ink was very difficult at first, despite the film being based on a hugely successful stage play. He left the audience to read into that whatever they wanted, before adding that the shortage of money ultimately helped, because it gave the team a siege mentality while they were making it.

Studiocanal eventually fully financed the film and later partnered with Netflix on its release.

Boyle said one of the biggest challenges was stopping people from judging the film before they had seen it. He described The Sun as "very Marmite" and said the team wanted audiences to come in with an open mind.

Set in 1969, Ink follows Rupert Murdoch (Guy Pearce) as he buys the struggling broadsheet The Sun and hires the brash editor Albert "Larry" Lamb (O'Connell) to turn it around. Their partnership transforms it into Britain's most successful and controversial tabloid, and lays the foundations of modern tabloid culture, including the infamous Page 3.

Claire Foy plays Jules Davies, a fictional reporter who combines several real people who worked at the paper. Brian Gleeson also stars.

Graham, who also wrote Dear England and Sherwood, adapted the screenplay from his own 2017 play, which ran in London and on Broadway and earned a Tony nomination. Boyle produces with Tessa Ross, Michael Ellenberg and Tracey Seaward, reuniting him with Ross for the first time since Slumdog Millionaire.

Ink had its world premiere as the opening film of the 83rd Venice International Film Festival in September, Boyle's first film at the festival. At the press conference there, he said the film does not turn Murdoch into a monster, and Graham revealed that Murdoch had seen the play twice, in the West End and on Broadway.

The film is the follow-up to Boyle's 2025 horror hit 28 Years Later, which also starred O'Connell. Its trailer leans into the story with the tagline "They broke the news".

Ink also screens at the 70th BFI London Film Festival, which features 251 titles this year. It opens in UK and Irish cinemas on Friday 8 January 2027.