Get Ready For Valentine's Day With A Romantic Irish Love Story Inspired By U2's "Every Breaking Wave"

Don't have a valentine to snuggle up next to tomorrow? If you already ruled out listening to the saddest albums of the decade so far, we've got something else for you. It's a video short set to U2's "Every Breaking Wave,"" and depicts the love story of two star-crossed lovers in Northern Ireland during the sectarian unrest of the 1980s. It's a punk rock Romeo and Juliet with brogues, if you will.

Created by Irish director Aoife McArdle, the video is based on the U2 song "Every Breaking Wave," and wraps the story of boy meets girl in the era of "The Troubles," when Northern Ireland's Catholics and Protestants engaged in a tacit street war over control of the nation and its destiny. It was released by The Creators Project yesterday. Read more about the short film the in press release and watch U2 perform the song live.

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NEW YORK, NY (February 12, 2015) The Creators Project today premieres Irish director Aoife McArdle’s Every Breaking Wave, a short film based on the U2 song of the same name. Set on the streets of early 1980s Northern Ireland, Every Breaking Wave is built around themes of emotional abandon and the uncertainty of romantic relationships.

Every Breaking Wave follows two teenagers, one Catholic and the other Protestant, who fall in love amidst ongoing violence. The short film's emotional core is centered around "Every Breaking Wave" and "The Troubles," two tracks drawn from U2's most recent album Songs of Innocence.

Talking about her vision for the short film, Belfast-born McArdle said, "I wanted to make a film about what it was like to be a teenager in the early '80s in Northern Ireland. All the different pressures on you, the pressures of friendship, of falling in love for the first time, and all that in the face of huge troubles. Violence was inescapable on your doorstep. I remember very vividly what it was like to grow up when there were bombs going off and army everywhere so I did draw on a lot of memories.

I hope people see that it's a story. A story that's based on real stories. It's like capturing a time. And I hope people feel inspired by how resilient teenagers at that time were in Northern Ireland, and moved by their ability to live life in as full a way as possible, despite the circumstances."

U2's The Edge expressed admiration of the short film, stating, "The Aoife McArdle short film expands on the theme of Songs of Innocence which was largely rooted in our experience growing up in the early eighties in Dublin. Aoife chose west Belfast in the same period, as it was the neighborhood that was so formative to her. We think her work is something pretty extraordinary.”

Filmmaker Spike Jonze said of Aoife McArdle's short film, "I had never seen anything by Aoife before but was really taken with this film. She captured that feeling and size of life of being a teenager and of first love so well. She drifts between the reality of friends and first love into fantasy so effortlessly and romantically. It's a perfect little gem of a romance movie."

After watching the film, Birdman writer/director Alejandro González Iñárritu remarked, “The piece is full of sound and fury. It contains all that a young artist's work should: a lot of things to say and feel, said with fucking guts, vision and ambition. There is no fear in McArdle's piece but plenty of humanity; shot and expressed with poetry without betraying the truth”

“Aoife McArdle has pulled off one of the most difficult tasks facing any filmmaker; she has taken a Romeo and Juliet romance, set in the back streets and alleyways of Belfast, and created a universal story." said Hotel Rwanda writer/director Terry George. "Aoife has captured the tragedy of our young men and women, so full of life and passion, energy and possibility, being swallowed up by the destroying rage of poverty, bigotry and repression."

The Creators Project sat down with Aoife McArdle, who discussed the inspiration behind and making of the short film. Read it here: thecreatorsproject.vice.com/every-breaking-wave

Every Breaking Wave, a film directed by Aoife McArdle and produced by Somesuch.