“We would have injected vitamin C if only they had made it illegal!”

PoolMan’s rating: If you spell swear words with an ‘E’ at the end, is it okay?

PoolMan’s review: The first time I saw Trainspotting was roughly four years ago, and I hated it. I really did. I was in no kind of head space to watch people swim in toilets and babies crawl on ceilings. I couldn’t understand Begbie’s inclination towards violence at all. It took years of passive contemplation and additional viewings (with almost exactly the same audience around me) to appreciate what kind of film this is.

Make no mistake, it’s a cult classic.

Trainspotting is, at first glance, about heroin addiction. Easy enough. If that’s all you’re expecting, you’ll basically treat it as a tough-to-understand-what-they’re-saying documentary, and you’ll probably dismiss it as Justin (and, initally, yours truly) did. But digging deeper, it’s about a lot more of society’s compulsions; sex, violence, money, success, consumerism, and a whack of other things that will make you think.

We follow Mark Renton (McGregor) in a period of his life where he’s hopelessly addicted to heroin and wants to escape it. But at the same time, he can’t possibly let it go. Every attempt at going clean eventually ends up with him shooting up yet again. From the character level, that’s the ultimate question that the movie leaves you with: With everything that leads up to the ending, can Renton change his life? Or will he screw it all up again, as we’ve already witnessed several times during the film?

This really is a character piece. It can be really interesting to try and get your head around what each character is doing, and what their particular vice is. Begbie (Robert Carlyle) stands out particularly as probably the most interesting, outside of Renton himself. Begbie utterly disdains the use of drugs, referring to them repeatedly as poison that he’d never put in his own body. Yet he surrounds himself with addicts and ultimately tries to make a quick score selling the stuff. He also has his own addiction: violence. Carlyle looks as crazy as a man can be in this flick, starting fights and immediately going for his knife. He’s a man half my size, but the snake eyes he puts on intimidate the hell out of me.

The other characters all have their memorable points too. Spud is helpless and stupid against the influence of his drug of choice and his friends, harmless as he is. Sick Boy is a hopelessly self-centered snake, charming and clean looking, but always ready to betray his friends. Tommy is the mirror to Renton; as Rent tries to clean up, Tommy decides to leave his already relatively sparkling life behind. Last but not least, Dianne is a love interest like no other. Believe me, this is all just skimming the surface of a truly strange and captivating cast.

As for Rent himself, Ewan McGregor carries this movie. Renton is the focus of every moment of the film. Everything he does, for better or worse, directly affects everyone else. But as good an actor as McGregor was here (just 25 when the movie was shot), he puts almost too likeable a face on Renton. The book of Trainspotting paints Renton as a much more vile character, and Ewan’s relative good looks and demeanor almost give up the game. There are moments in the movie where he looks like death warmed over, but you’re usually rooting for him, for better or for worse.

There are funny moments to this movie though. Watching Spud intentionally throw his job interview (by taking speed before he goes in) is good — if not clean — fun. Seeing Rent introduce himself to Dianne’s parents is similarly amusing.

But the moments of levity are definitely spaced pretty thinly, and applying the term ‘comedy’ is a pretty big misnomer. Be prepared to take advantage of the rare laughs you get, because the rest of the film is dedicated to being a lot harder on its viewer.

This is a depressing movie. My lovely Better Half™ is a lunatic for this film, but has passed on several opportunities to buy the video/DVD. As she puts it, she loves the movie very much, but it’s not one she could own. I can understand that. It’s worth every ounce of its R-rating, so go in with your eyes open and your mind ready for some truly horrific things, but definitely go in.