I’M not trying to make you feel your age or anything but Trainspotting is 20 years old. Well, let me clarify that a little: director Danny Boyle’s film version of Irvine Welsh’s book is 20 years old. If we’re talking the novel you have to go back to 1993.
Based around a series of rambling life stories of a group of Leith heroin addicts and utilising diaries kept by Welsh as he navigated the 1990s rave scene, the book caused considerable controversy when it appeared and it continues to divide critics to this day.
It’s tough going, for sure. There’s a grimness in the pores of the prose that was always going to turn some readers away. Welsh frames the often disjointed misadventures of his characters in the seedy urban surroundings of Edinburgh housing estates, deadbeat bars and overflowing public toilets and the language is raw and vital.
Despite occasional claims that his writing glorifies the life of the everyday smack user, his tale is woven with self-doubt and misery throughout and everything is played out in an environment that’s as far removed from glamorous as it’s possible to imagine.
Perhaps the multitude of characters featured or the plethora of harsh Edinburgh accents proved a little too strong for some tastes. Rumour has it several members of the Booker Prize judging panel took offence at the subject matter, which might explain how it failed to make its way from the long list to the shortlist that year.
Such industry acknowledgement, or lack of, hardly matters, though. Welsh’s book caught the 90s zeitgeist perfectly and a film version was inevitable.
That’s where the team of director Danny Boyle, producer Andrew McDonald and writer John Hodge come in. Fresh from the considerable critical acclaim that had been lavished on their first film together, Shallow Grave, they bought the rights and began attempting to make a movie from a book some felt was unfilmable.
It’s Hodge's concise screenplay that makes the story palatable to a mainstream cinema audience. He puts the character of Renton bang in the centre of events and gives the film focus. Long, free flowing segments in the book are jettisoned in favour of a relatively simple of tale of one young man and his descent into the grasp of a drug that was ravaging inner-city Britain at the time.
Boyle’s ability to deliver genuinely exciting visuals from rough-and-ready material has never been in doubt but here he surpasses himself.
Ewan McGregor made the jump from the cast of Shallow Grave and grabs the chance to play the career-defining role of Renton with both hands. He’s matched in his swagger by the likes of Johnny Lee Miller, Ewan Bremner and Robert Carlyle, who imbues the psycho role of Begbie with an edginess all his own.
Then there’s the small issue of the soundtrack. Crammed with late 80s, early 90s tracks and the iconic appearance of Perfect Day from Lou Reed, the music amplifies the key moments of the plot beautifully.
With Trainspotting 2 in the pipeline, it’s worth remembering just how powerful that first film is.
