Choose life.
Choose an award winning novel by Irvine Welsh.
Choose an up and coming British director and a young cast of unknown actors.
Choose a gritty Scottish setting.
Or, like the characters of the iconic Brit-flick Trainspotting, you can forget all of that and choose heroin instead.
Trainspotting, set in a run down area of Scotland, follows Renton (Ewan McGregor) and his friends as they ignore life and choose drug addiction. We meet dopey Spud, clean cut Tommy, dodgy dealer Sick Boy, schoolgirl Diane and violent psychopath Begbie. We follow as Renton tries to get clean only to repeatedly fall off the wagon. From sexual exploits, surreal encounters to acts of extreme violence, the effect and consequences that drugs have differ for each member of the group. Eventually Renton’s parents intervene to get him clean and he sets out to live life but soon his old friends come knocking at his door.
Over twenty years on and Danny Boyle’s gritty low budget take on heroin addiction still ranks amongst the best British films ever made. The films refusal to sugar coat the highs and lows of addiction means that even today it is still considered controversial.
Boyle today is accepted as one of the top film makers in the world but in 1994, he was new to the world of film. His first full length feature film, Shallow Grave, was a success and lead to his attachment to Welsh’s novel. After securing a small budget from Channel 4 Film, he began a seven week shoot. His budget restraints meant more hands on effects were employed as well as most of the scenes only being shot once. Instead of hindering the film, this only adds to its raw power and gritty feel. He cast one of his leads from Shallow Grave to play Renton and the rest of the cast were made up of relatively unknowns.
So many accounts of addiction either dehumanised it characters or down play their struggle with drugs. The film does something amazing in that it humanised addicts while showing the inhumane things they do. No more in the film is this more present than in the scene after a night of drug use when they awaken to find the infant Dawn dead. Instead of calling an ambulance or the police Renton chooses to shoot up again. This is not because he’s cold or inhumane but because he has a way to not feel guilt. He chooses drugs to escape pain, which is something that although we may not like we understand. The use of dramatic tension, going from joy to despair, makes the scene even more shocking.
Boyle tells the story through the eyes of an addict. Once Renton’s parent intervene and lock him in a room to get through withdrawal the audience is subjected to images, noises and feelings that are unimaginable. From Spud’s jail chains banging on the wall, Diane singing, and most shocking, baby Dawn crawling on the ceiling towards him. The audience are pulled into a powerful story that up until that point, and rarely since, has been told.
Boyle’s mixture of surreal film making and gritty social realisms is never more accomplished than in Trainspotting. Like the characters, whose use of drugs leave them void to reality, you watch as Renton inserts rectal suppositories only to lose them in a toilet then swim down and get them. You are forced to accept this dazed version of events as the characters have too.
In the scene where Renton takes a hit, overdoses and sinks into the floor, the edges of the carpet are present in the following shots. They stay until he is taken to A&E, revived and hastily exhumed from inside his carpeted void.
To play the role of Renton McGregor had too lose almost two stone in weight as well as shave his head. Not only does he physically embody the character but his charismatic performance means we warm to him and his struggles. We see him at his best and more frequently his worst but not through judging eyes. His portrayal of addiction is raw and honest. He humanises the struggle to be better despite temptations to give in. McGregor is well supported by the talented secondary cast. From Johnny Lee Miller’s tragically down spiralling Sick Boy to Robert Carlyle’s violent criminal Begbie, they all aid in the tale of late 1980’s economic and personal struggle.
The music of the film is vital in creating its context. From Iggy Pop to Underworld its 1980’s rock, brit-pop and electronica. The music does what a soundtrack should do in film, it enhances the story. From Lou Reeds Perfect Day during Renton’s dazed overdose to New Order’s Temptation inside a nightclub (during a sneaky Clockwork Orange reference). The varied styles of music enhance the thoughts, feelings and struggles of each character as well as creating its context.
The film is a masterpiece of cinema and considered Boyle’s greatest work (although, I will put up one hell of a debate for 28 Days Later). It is a brilliant, if unsavoury story that is expertly directly and wonderfully acted. In another twenty years time, critics and audiences alike will still marvel at its power and with the long awaited sequel, T2 released this month, there is potential for another cult classic to marvel over.