Trainspotting
1 Oscar Nominations
Rent/Purchase
Heroin addict Mark Renton stumbles through bad ideas and sobriety attempts with his unreliable friends --Sick Boy, Begbie, Spud and Tommy. He also has an underage girlfriend, Diane, along for the ride. After cleaning up and moving from Edinburgh to London, Mark finds he can't escape the life he left behind as Begbie and Sick Boy come knocking.
What critics thought
Danny Boyle's film landed as a genuine provocation — stylistically electric, built on Ewan McGregor's magnetic performance, and anchored by a soundtrack used with unusual precision. The main fault line among critics was whether its kinetic energy amounted to something more than a thrilling surface: some felt the flash and energy captured real psychological truth about addiction, while others argued the film lacked the narrative depth and dramatic range to fully reckon with its subject matter.
“acted out with a freedom of expression that's often astonishing”
Derek Malcolm·The Guardian
“Like Scorsese and Tarantino, Boyle uses pop songs as rhapsodic mood enhancers, though in his own ravey-hypnotic style. Whether he's staging a fumbly sex montage to Sleeper's version of "Atomic" or having Renton go cold turkey to the ominous slow build of Underworld's "Dark and Long" ... Trainspotting keeps us wired to the pulse of its characters' passions”
Owen Gleiberman·Entertainment Weekly
“Trainspotting doesn't have much narrative holding it together. Nor does it really have the dramatic range to cope with such wild extremes. Most of it sticks to the same moderate pitch, with entertainment value enhanced by Mr. Boyle's savvy use of wide angles, bright colours, attractively clean compositions and a dynamic pop score”
Janet Maslin·The New York Times
“the film's flash can't disguise the emptiness of these blasted lives. Trainspotting is 90 minutes of raw power that Boyle and a bang-on cast inject right into the vein”
Peter Travers·Rolling Stone
“Like Twister and Independence Day, this movie is a theme-park ride – though it's a much better one, basically a series of youthful thrills, spills, chills, and swerves rather than a story intended to say very much”
Jonathan Rosenbaum·Chicago Reader
Genres
Crime, Drama
Cast & Crew
DirectorDanny Boyle
StarringEwan McGregor, Ewen Bremner, Jonny Lee Miller, Kevin McKidd, Robert Carlyle
Trainspotting
1 Oscar Nominations
Heroin addict Mark Renton stumbles through bad ideas and sobriety attempts with his unreliable friends --Sick Boy, Begbie, Spud and Tommy. He also has an underage girlfriend, Diane, along for the ride. After cleaning up and moving from Edinburgh to London, Mark finds he can't escape the life he left behind as Begbie and Sick Boy come knocking.
What critics thought
Danny Boyle's film landed as a genuine provocation — stylistically electric, built on Ewan McGregor's magnetic performance, and anchored by a soundtrack used with unusual precision. The main fault line among critics was whether its kinetic energy amounted to something more than a thrilling surface: some felt the flash and energy captured real psychological truth about addiction, while others argued the film lacked the narrative depth and dramatic range to fully reckon with its subject matter.
“acted out with a freedom of expression that's often astonishing”
Derek Malcolm·The Guardian
“Like Scorsese and Tarantino, Boyle uses pop songs as rhapsodic mood enhancers, though in his own ravey-hypnotic style. Whether he's staging a fumbly sex montage to Sleeper's version of "Atomic" or having Renton go cold turkey to the ominous slow build of Underworld's "Dark and Long" ... Trainspotting keeps us wired to the pulse of its characters' passions”
Owen Gleiberman·Entertainment Weekly
“Trainspotting doesn't have much narrative holding it together. Nor does it really have the dramatic range to cope with such wild extremes. Most of it sticks to the same moderate pitch, with entertainment value enhanced by Mr. Boyle's savvy use of wide angles, bright colours, attractively clean compositions and a dynamic pop score”
Janet Maslin·The New York Times
“the film's flash can't disguise the emptiness of these blasted lives. Trainspotting is 90 minutes of raw power that Boyle and a bang-on cast inject right into the vein”
Peter Travers·Rolling Stone
“Like Twister and Independence Day, this movie is a theme-park ride – though it's a much better one, basically a series of youthful thrills, spills, chills, and swerves rather than a story intended to say very much”
Jonathan Rosenbaum·Chicago Reader
Genres
Crime, Drama
Cast & Crew
DirectorDanny Boyle
StarringEwan McGregor, Ewen Bremner, Jonny Lee Miller, Kevin McKidd, Robert Carlyle
Rent/Purchase