Very good film that relies on visual style over narrative but delivers an anti-drug message, amongst other things, all the same.

Rating: 8/10 (1 October 2008)

A film like Trainspotting can split your opinion right down the middle; a split more akin to the sort of opinion you might take away from a horror film. This split decision revolves around two things; firstly the gross content. Any film that makes you feel uneasy or quite sick at what's going on on screen could automatically plant a negative opinion within your mind but this idea battles with the effectiveness of the film in the sense; if a film is so nasty in its content and unravelling of events that it evokes a definite reaction from the viewer, it could be deemed a success because the filmmakers have succeeded in what they set out to do.
Trainspotting is one of those films. Like I mentioned, horror films usually have this effect. An example could be Wolf Creek or Hostel; two films that gave me a distinct feeling of unpleasantness but some other recent horror films, such as The Descent or Miike's One Missed Call can leave me without any feeling at all as they meander along to their inevitable conclusions; throwing in plenty of blood-soaked action or dull jumps along the way. Are Wolf Creek and Hostel 'better' than these two because I had more of a reaction to them? Or are The Descent and One Missed Call 'better' because they didn't gross me out.
Trainspotting isn't a horror film, but it borders on being a horrible film and I mean that in the nicest possible way. The film is so vile and disgusting in its visuals and establishing of certain situations (one in a public toilet springs to mind) that you just can't help but admire what they've done effect-wise but feel a little uneasy all the same. It's this emotional juxtaposition that director Danny Boyle pulls off here and I think it's this that makes Trainspotting the film it is, especially given the fact it is not particularly plot driven. Obviously you hear and take in a lot of what's already been said about a film as well known as Trainspotting and a film as 'accepted' as Trainspotting but it's more than a mere flavour of the month for a certain generation.
At the time when this was made, the British crime genre (and later the gangster genre) could be seen as genres in a state of transition. Two years previously, with Paul W. S. Anderson's 'Shopping', there was a film that revolved around Britain's youth as they get up to youth orientated activities to do with crime. Then came Boyle's own Shallow Grave before this, a story about lowlifes doing low brow things always connected to crime. But it isn't the demonising of ram raiding and joyriding as seen in Shopping that is being studied here, more so the frequent use of the class A drug heroin. The film revolves around Renton (McGregor) and his cronies, all of whom are introduced somewhat perfectly at the very beginning echoing a tactic the godfather of British crime films Brighton Rock used at the very beginning of that film and something Guy Ritchie's 'Snatch.' would later re-use.
Trainspotting is told from a second person point of view, that is the narrator is involved in the events he is telling us of. It's easy to miss but Renton actually comes off heroin on two occasions, from memory, in this film with the final time adding to the film's overall final twist. As an anti-hero, Renton fits the bill quite well. Whilst utterly despicable in his casualness at talking about and taking heroin, scenes that will no doubt have you winching if needles are not your bag, he sort of redeems himself when he talks about wanting to come off it and is put across as a social person who does seem to have certain hobbies and interests outside of being a junkie; namely talking about actors, films and Academy Awards.
As with all youth orientated films, youth orientated activity plays a big role. Since the principal study here is the damning of heroin, secondary studies like casual sex and the over consumption of alcohol can be wrapped up in double quick time and take nothing away from the film. In fact the film can deliver these moral messages in more ways than one and actually turn them into entertaining scenes without ever feeling like a lecture or lesson. The scene where Renton tries to pick up a young girl at a club only to find out she was underage is one demonisation; Begbie's (Carlyle) incident with a cross dresser in an ever changing world he is in ignorance of is another incident and on another occasion a character and his partner wish to watch a previously recorded sex session as they commit the act once again; only the guy accidentally lent the tape to someone else thinking it was another video. Panic ensures when they assume it to be back at the video rental store.
So while Trainspotting is a thrill ride that conflicts pleasantries with your filmic mind and that lust for a good, effective film; it holds up. There is a switch between realism (in general) and surrealism when he ventures down a toilet to find drugs and comes home wet to the eerie 'rehab-at-home' scene in which an apparent ghost of a previously dead baby climbs the walls and terrorises our hero as his friends and family slip in and out of the bed with him. Trainspotting is fast, furious and unrelenting in its content that can be funny; suspenseful; quite scary and downright disgusting Â– it's one of those film viewing experiences you don't forget in a hurry.