Steve McQueen's 'Blitz' trailer sees Saoirse Ronan amid the WWII London bombings

Sir Steve McQueen's Blitz is set to close the New York Film Festival and then open the BFI London Film Festival this year, the latter a fitting context for the lauded director to send audiences into one of the most terrifying and tragically defining periods of modern British history.

The film is set amid The Blitz in World War II, when the UK was attacked for months in German Luftwaffe air raids, including the systematic bombing of London. Over 43,500 civilians were killed.

In Blitz, nine-year-old George (Elliott Heffernan) is sent by his mother Rita (Saoirse Ronan) to the countryside for safety, but George decides to return to her by himself — and a dangerous journey it is. The cast is stacked on this one, with Paul Weller, Harris Dickinson, Benjamin Clementine, Kathy Burke, Weller, Stephen Graham, Leigh Gill, Mica Ricketts, CJ Beckford, Alex Jennings, Joshua McGuire, Hayley Squires, Erin Kellyman and Sally Messham.

Blitz sees McQueen reunite with many of his collaborators including 12 Years a Slave production designer Adam Stockhausen and composer Hans Zimmer, and Small Axe costume designer Jacqueline Durran. They're joined by Little Women cinematographer Yorick Le Saux and No Time to Die makeup designer Naomi Donne.

Blitz will premiere in select cinemas on Nov. 1 before streaming on Apple TV+ on Nov. 22.