Colin Farrell, who is at the San Sebastián Film Festival with Edward Berger’s “Ballad of a Small Player,” spoke at the film’s press conference about his preparation to play gambling addict Lord Doyle in the fast-paced thriller. “It’s pretty well-chronicled now my history with addiction, but I don’t think you have to be an addict to play an addict,” he said frankly. “I found [Doyle’s] internal push and pull to be a lovely place to start.”

“He is somebody who doesn’t believe in his own worth, who is very self-centered to the point of being despicable,” he continued. “I still don’t have answers to anything in the script; I just have the experience of being in front of the camera with my fellow actors. As far as preparations go, I suppose I have some form of OCD that is given good life in regard to acting because you get to obsess about the characters and maybe imagine their history, their own personal kind of origin story.”

“Ballad of a Small Player” is playing in official selection at the Basque festival just a year after Berger’s “Conclave” bowed at the same event. Adapted from Lawrence Osborne’s novel, the film finds Lord Doyle adrift in the Eastern gambling mecca of Macau as his past and debts catch up with him. Close to breaking point, the man encounters a kindred spirit who might just hold the key to his salvation.

Speaking about the practicalities of playing a gambler, Farrell recalled spending time within Macau’s sprawling casinos and learning about an addiction he is “thankful” to not have experienced. “Gambling is one affliction that never really came near me. I’m glad to say I only damaged my body and my brain, not my bank account.”

“It was interesting to see some of the high rollers in Macau. They put down some very serious money. One day backstage, one of the floor managers said, ‘We had two players last night and the house did pretty well.’ I said, ‘What’s pretty well to the house?,’ and he said, ‘At the end of four hours of playing, we were up to 24 million [Hong Kong Dollars].’”

“The opportunity is there, that kind of aspiration to have that moment of good fortune and live the life you feel will give you the ultimate joy and the ultimate happiness,” he added. “We all kind of understand at this stage from looking to each other and the world that materials are fine and great — and I say that as someone very fortunate to have experienced a lot of material things in my life — but if you’re looking for contentment, happiness, joy, connection, it’s fool’s gold.”

Asked about the ins and outs of card playing in the film, Farrell said it got a bit “tedious” at times due to the repetition. “We spent a lot of time on casino floors during the making of this film, and I can’t say it didn’t get tedious at certain times, but [Edward] knew it wasn’t always about being excited at that moment.”

Farrell praised how Berger approached inserts with background information in both “Ballad” and “Conclave,” stating that “too many inserts can be didactic and lead my attention somewhere I don’t feel it needs to go towards, but with Edward, the first five minutes of ‘Conclave’ have a completely cinematic language to his use of inserts.” With “Ballad,” even if Farrell found the repetition morose, he said it was still “a joy to be around” the director and witness “the incredible creative language happening” at those moments of technical craft.

Asked about his thoughts on luck, given that his Lord Doyle is a man perpetually chasing the elusive concept, the Irish actor said: “We can never choose how life confronts us. We can choose how to respond to that confrontation.”

“You just meet life where it meets you, and you do the best you can,” he continued. “Somebody who lives in a 30 thousand square foot mansion in Bel Air could put 20 dollars in a dog race and lose and say, ‘Jesus, I’m really unlucky.’ It’s very subjective, the idea of luck. You do the best you can and try to serve your true self, the people you love, and your community. That is certainly not what Doyle is doing in this film at all. He is serving the lowest ethical, moral aspect of his internal life.”

“Ballad of a Small Player” opens in U.S. theaters on Oct. 15, arrives in the U.K. and Ireland cinemas on Oct. 17, and debuts on Netflix on Oct. 29.