The film has drawn some fire for being too one sided, in not portraying the Somalis with much depth. Do you agree?

Hopefully the lack of a direct Somali voice in the book is made up for by a kind of atmospheric attention to what the Somalis were doing in their day to day lives. I don't know if it was captured the very best it could have been, but I think Ridley did an excellent job of moving in that direction as much as he possibly could.

Did you find it easy to identify with your character, Staff Sgt Matt Eversmann?

I think he's someone who knew more about the situation than most of the Rangers there. He still teaches at the army war college, he's very into education and that sort of thing. He's a very thoughtful guy, so it was very easy for me to stand by his views, even though they aren't necessarily my views.

Did playing a soldier in the film make you think how you might have reacted in that situation?

I can understand the attitude of these soldiers from their perspective. But if I was put in the same situation I wouldn't know what to do. When it comes down to it I'm someone who doesn't know if I could ever kill a man. Put in a situation where I had to kill someone I loved in order to defend them, then maybe I would. That particular conflict was so interesting within the film, and within this character. That sort of defined it for me.