Effectively Bizarre

Rating: Null/10 (22 December 2000)

I am glad that I finally broke down and viewed Trainspotting. Since its release in 1996, the only comments I have heard about it include terms like "weird", "bizarre", "out-there", and "demented". Nobody really advocated it one way or the other. I thought that it might be on par with cult "classics" like Liquid Sky, which is easily on my 10-worst list. I will admit that many sequences in Trainspotting appear whimsically unusual, but nothing ever deviates from the film's strong, central thrust. Both the glamour and gore of heroin addiction are born out and inflated in such ways that the viewer can truly appreciate the characters' desperate plights--I will never forget Ewan McGregor's "skin diving" experience nor his withdrawal episode involving a deceased toddler. Director Danny Boyle can be commended for his poignant use of hyperbole and caricature to drive home the extremes being experienced by this group of people and the fact that there is a glimmer of hope for them ("choose life...").