Downton Abbey star Brendan Coyle stars in movie honouring Irish woman's heroic rescue of a million Vietnamese street children

Christina Noble saves nearly one million street children in Vietnam.(Wikipedia)

As a young Irish girl, Christina Noble had a harrowing childhood. She felt alone and helpless since she was an orphan, so when she grew up, she set out to help all the young boys and girls who have no one else to turn to.

The film "Noble" is based on her life's journey and how it led her to Vietnam, where she eventually rescued nearly one million street children, reported Breathecast.

Her journey, of course, did not come without any upheavals. Noble was an emotional wreck - firstly living in the Irish slums, then being separated from her first child, who was given up for adoption without her knowledge.

She questioned God for all the hardships that came her way, until she received a prophetic dream. She journeyed to Vietnam in 1989 at the age of 44 to fulfil that dream, but it was quite a daunting task.

Though she grew up in poverty herself, Noble was shocked by the extent of the poverty in Vietnam, and she saw how thousands of street children who were forced to lose their innocence because they had no choice.

She even had to fight the Vietnamese government and many others to fulfil her mission. But instead of backing down,  Noble resolved to fight harder to save the children's lives.

"It's a story about the triumph of the human spirit over adversity," said Deirdre O'Kane (Moone Boy, Paths To Freedom), the actress who plays Noble in the film.

The movie is by Aspiration Media and will hit theatres on May 8.  It also stars Brendan Coyle (Downton Abbey, The Raven, Ailsa), Sarah Greene (The Guard, The Cripple of Inishmann), and Liam Cunningham (Game Of Thrones, Hunger, Safe House).

Noble is also the founder of The Christina Noble Children's Foundation (www.cncf.org), which runs more than 100 projects across Vietnam and Mongolia, helping to improve the lives of nearly one million children and their families since 1991.