Trainspotting

I went to the Reading Vue on Wednesday night last week to see Trainspotting.  They've been having a season of showing old or classic films recently, so I thought that given Danny Boyle's dramatic rise to national prominence over the last few years it would be fun to go and see one of his early classics in a big screen.

Trainspotting was and remains something of a cult film.  It starred Ewan McGregor, Robert Carlyle and Kelly MacDonald; each giving a performance that provided a platform from which to launch their careers.  The story is of Mark Renton (played by McGregor) and his 'friends', most of whom are heroin addicts living in a run-down area of suburban Edinburgh.  The film is about the life of this heroin-addicted Scot who is unrepentant about his choice of lifestyle in the age of Cool Britannia, but at a deeper level it's about how we all choose to live our lives, the choices we all make and then living with the aftermath.  The film is also a historical document of the music, trends, fashions and way of life of the mid-90s.  It was made in 1996, a year when I was doing my A-levels and finally able to go into pubs without fear of getting ID'd, so many of the fashions are painfully reminiscent of younger, simpler times.

It's tough to pick my favourite scene from the film.  Though Robert Carlyle's swivel-eyed ranting as the psychotic Begbie provide the most memorable individual moments and the film's 5 minute opening sequence is part of the British cinematic iconography, I think the most beautiful sequence is the one in which Renton suffers a bad reaction to an injection and ends up in hospital.



The sequence is lovingly crafted and the music (Lou Reid's "Perfect Day") is the ideal accompaniment.  For Renton the moment of injection is his perfect moment, but it's deeply melancholy at the same time as the look in his eye tells us he's terrified of what he's unleashing on himself.  It's a great film from a director who has given us his fair share of great films over the years, keep 'em coming please Mr Boyle.