Trainspotting was a good movie which was able to make things interesting and entertaining even though the film dealt with pretty serious and controversial topics. The movie was able to blend the serious elements of the film with comedic aspects which turned into an in depth look at addiction and how it does not just affect an individual but everyone around them without being too boring and full of dialogue. The plot of the film is all about the lives of a group of friends who are heroin addicts living in London. The film is a cycle of the group, or some of its members, wanting to quit their heroine addiction where they successfully do, but it almost never lasts for long. It is clear from the start of the film that the main character from the group, Mark Renton, is the one who is most determined to become clean permanently, but because of different circumstances, he slips back into his addiction. My main takeaway from the film was how it portrayed addiction in a way that showed the audience just how bad it can get for people who are addicted to illegal substances. I think that Trainspotting is one of the few films that I have watched which gave a good portrayal of addiction without demonizing or putting down the addict. What I mean by this is in some movies, when the topic of addiction arises, we often see the addicted character as a bad person which makes them unlikable. On the other hand, Trainspotting made the characters seem likeable and relatable which moved the audience’s feelings towards them to a sense of pity and sympathy from hate and disgust. This sense of pity is what I felt the most for Mark Renton’s character because, as I have stated above, he seems to genuinely want to quit his addiction and longs for a better life for himself, but it seems like he just can not get away from his troublesome friends. This was clearly seen in the film when Mark’s friends tracked him down even though he left their town and moved away without telling them where he was going. Mark was doing well for himself and it seemed like he really had left behind his life as an addict, but his friends, Begbie and Sick Boy, just would not let him escape their clutches. The film’s latter portion saw Mark being pushed around by his friends, mainly by Begbie, and forced to do things he does not really want to such as shelling out his savings for heroine. In the end, Mark gets away with most of the money they got from selling the heroine which we could only hope he uses to get away from his addict friends. All in all, I think Trainspotting is a good movie that was entertaining while also tackling important social issues such as drug abuse. For me, their portrayal of addiction will be one of the most relatable portrayals because it makes the audience really feel like they are going through what the characters are going through.

Trainspotting is a 1996 crime drama film featuring Ewan McGregor as Mark Renton and his heroin-addicted friends. Renton opens the film by telling people: “Choose Life. Choose a job. Choose a career…” and a bunch of other things that typically represent “normal life”—a satire of everyone else, meaning, everyone else who is not addicted to heroin like him. The film depicts the life of Renton and his friends who are struggling against heroin.

‘Trainspotting’ as many might not know, is a slang for shooting up heroin through the veins. This often leaves a dark line that you can see through the veins on the arm, which they call a “track,” hence, why injecting heroin through the veins is also called ‘trainspotting.’ As they say, small gestures count but we’re all suckers for big things. Trainspotting is a film about pleasure—or pleasures for that matter. It is a struggle between pleasures—heroin or normal life, an underaged girlfriend or following the law, Iggy Pop or Lizzy (in the case of Tommy).

As Renton attempts to get away from the pleasure of heroin to pursue the pleasure of a normal life—normal according to popular practice, at least—he finds himself to be a mockery by normal life. As much as he wants to separate himself from heroin, he hates the side of “normal life” that looks down upon him as a piece of trash. He knows that heroin isn’t healthy but he also doesn’t want to be like the normal people who call heroin addicts like him ‘trash’. Normal people, in his eyes, become monsters, and though a part of him seeks the pleasure of this “normal life” that does not depend on heroin, he can’t help going back. He knows it’s bad for him but it makes him feel so good, so much better than the monsters of “normal life”—his parents, a job, mortgage, bills, and so on. But the heroin life isn’t easy either. Renton laments: “It looks easy, this, but it’s not. It looks like a doss, like a soft option. But living like this, it’s a full-time business. Pleasure always came at a cost, whichever form it took, be it heroin or “normal life.”

Unhappiness and pain—as much as people desire to get away from it, there can be no real escape. The pleasure is always temporary. People get jobs because they want to escape poverty and owing money. People have friendships, family, even sex, in order to escape loneliness. People take drugs just to escape the general feeling of it. Every day is a struggle for another hit.

It is the same struggle whichever century you were born in. People are quite obnoxious regarding this matter. They like to say that no one else could ever understand what they were going through. The pain may belong to only one person but what people forget is that everyone else has the brains to experience it. People have always struggled against some kind of suffering—wild animals, the miracles of nature, colonization, civil war, genocide. People often forget that while others may not feel your pain, they can feel pain—their own. Despite the pain we experience every day, the movie does teach us this: new things are coming and we must move on. The old will get older, the new will become old, and there will be more new. In the end, there is only forward—only, what kind of forward? Well, you choose.

Since our government’s planning to get rid of all drugs [and users] in the country through extra-judicial killings, Trainspotting can help change their perspective. They believe that they could just scare the users into stopping. They don’t take into account that addiction is a disease and curing it without getting any help is close to impossible. This film shows how hard it really is to quit especially when you’re already hooked.

Trainspotting shows the journey of a group of friends who are mostly addicted to heroin with some trying to be sober. However, unlike other crime movies focusing on drugs, it focuses more on the experiences and encounters of the users themselves. The scenes are from the perception of a user, specifically Mark Renton’s.

What I liked most about this movie is the fact that it made me learn a thing or two. Unlike Schizopolis or Shin Godzilla, I actually found out the specific events an addict goes through during the addiction and after, during the process of going sober. In the movie, Renton had to go through disturbing and tragic events before he sobered up for real. He had to witness a baby’s death, go to jail, and overdose on drugs before his parents locked him in his room to force him to sober up. Of all those scenes, the most upsetting scene that I still can’t get out of my mind is the one where he was locked up in his room. He was in remission so I understood that he felt uncomfortable and was probably in pain. Although, I wasn’t expecting the hallucinations. It’s already hard enough that these addicts find being in remission literally painful, but it also makes them go crazy because of all the things they see. What did Renton see? He saw his friend’s dead baby, crawling towards him…on the ceiling.

This was probably his guilt eating him up. He felt bad because their addiction was the reason why the mother of the baby neglected and stopped taking care of the baby even though they were all staying in one place all the time. When the baby was crawling towards him, he kept screaming. He was scared of the baby. This may be a reach but it is also possible that he was scared of getting addicted again because he knows that this is what it could lead to.

Overall, I liked the movie and it could even be my favorite out of all the movies we watched in class. Not only did I learn a thing or two about drug addiction, I also found it relevant to our country’s situation nowadays. In addition to that, it also showed how sobriety is always possible as long as you want it for yourself, commit to it, and surround yourself with people who you know will help you in reaching that goal.

“Choose your friends. Choose your future. Choose life.”

This was the opening and closing speech of the main character, Mark Renton, as he ran from both the authorities and his mates. At the beginning of the film, this scene made me look forward to the film with excitement and anticipation for the action that awaits; and at the end of the film, this scene rattled and threatened me, as it made me feel that Renton was coming for me, going to treat me the way he treated his friends and everyone else, and I would never be able to see him coming because he would be blending in with all of us typical people who chose life.

Trainspotting (1996) by Danny Boyle initially bothered me and my goody-two-shoes personality, as rebellion of any kind against my parents, friends, and society was something I was brought up to never do or tolerate. However, with its captivating colors, amazing wide shots and filming sites, convincing special effects and camera tricks, catchy soundtrack, and memorable yet not so lovable characters, soon enough I found myself on a roller coaster of entertainment and disgust at every turn of the film.

First, what interested me was the dark yet still seemingly lively and colorful color palettes used in the film. Upon further research, I discovered that the production designer, Kave Quinn, drew inspiration from two things: the shoot locations themselves and the paintings of Sir Francis Bacon.

The effectiveness of the color palettes somewhat served, at least to me, as metaphors of a life in substance abuse — lively and colorful, yes, but still in darkness. Related fact: Trainspotting was accused to have empowered an entire generation to “choose heroin” as critics claimed that the film “glamourized drugs.” Personally, however, as a child who grew up and still lives on a street where drugs are made, used, and abused by fellow lower middle class people, I think the film gave justice to this issue in its only honest portrayal of an addict’s difficult life.

Second, the wide shots captured the immensity, as well as the isolation of the characters in the extensive space, of both the indoor and outdoor filming sites. An indoor example would be Renton’s withdrawal scene, wherein the bedroom is shown to be long and spacious  yet somehow seems to close in on Renton. An outdoor example, on the other hand, would be the scene at the mountains, wherein Tommy adamantly says that they are “going for a walk!” The characters are seen to be isolated in contrast to the wideness of the mountains and field that surrounds them.

Third, the special effects and camera tricks were superb, especially when you consider what year the film was made and how much budget they had to work around with. I barely watched The Worst Toilet in Scotland scene because I thought it was going to make me throw up, but I was so curious as to how they managed to pull it off that I looked it up on the Internet and saw an explanation from behind the scenes regarding the mechanics of the toilet. If it is any consolation (albeit I admit it might just make things worse), the brown stuff in the toilet is apparently chocolate. I admired the construction of the toilet and the way Ewan McGregor made it work with his acting skills.

Another scene which warrants praise for special effects and camera tricks was Renton’s withdrawal scene. It has the camera inside the sheets, capturing Renton’s sweaty anxiety; the dead baby crawling on the ceiling and its cuts back to Renton, capturing his utter horror and inhuman shrieks; Renton’s friends under the sheets with him, standing at the side of the bed, or sitting on top of closet; Renton’s parents talking with a doctor about human immunodeficiency virus (HIV); and a random TV show. The camera kept moving, shaking, and cutting from weird angles to wide shots — an exhibition that more or less gave an accurate depiction of a cold turkey withdrawal from heroin, based on studies that describe the phenomenon.

I am not well-versed in songs from the 80’s or 90’s, so most of the music in the film were new to me — but in a way, still vaguely familiar either due to its catchy quality or its timelessness. Whatever the reason, the soundtrack was remarkable. Each song enhanced the experience of the scenes, highlighted the actions, and invoked the desired emotions to the viewers. Despite my love-hate relationship with the film, I downloaded most of the songs in the sound track just so they can now be a part of my life.

Lastly, the characters were quite distinguished and memorable, yet it was difficult to root for them as they were all equitably unlikeable in their own unique ways. Their rather toxic relationships with each other and with the people around them painted an image of the power of friendship: how it transcends lifetimes and circumstances, how it haunts and drags, and how it molds the people involved. Side note: as much as I do not enjoy reading while watching, I appreciated the subtitles of this film because their thick Scottish accents were difficult for me to follow.

Trainspotting was truly one of a kind: no wonder it became a cult classic and even had an entire generation named after it.

Trainspotting is a film directed by Danny Boyle, which was released in 1996. Honestly, it was quite a disturbing and peculiar film. Actually, scratch that – it was VERY disturbing and peculiar. I mean, come on, that toilet scene was completely revolting. It’s jaw – dropping seeing how illogical the actions of the characters were sometimes, but I guess it’s just the emphasis of them choosing not to actually live life and instead just heroin their life away. Now, with all that disgust aside, I actually think that it is in fact a brilliant approach to the issue of drug addiction. The film was just so raw with regards to how it presented it; and by raw I mean it just completely showed how unpleasant heroin is physically that you just ask yourself “Is that really how much angst they have to live their lives in that way?” (well, aside from the fact that they were addicted). If the scenes where they were hooked on heroin wasn’t surreal enough, the withdrawal was just as terrifying. I didn’t even know how to feel because it was just so horrible seeing how hard drugs can really put a human being into that position in which Mark Renton was in. I couldn’t imagine myself surviving the hallucinations that he was experiencing, it seemed so traumatic and well, it has done a great job in never making me want to try hard drugs – ever. I’m fairly sure that anyone who watches this film would feel just about the same. Thinking about it, the film presents a great parallelism in whichever addiction we currently have in our lives. It really comes down to what Mark Renton said in his monologue wherein it’s either you ‘choose life or choose heroin’; similarly, in our lives, whether we choose life or choose our own addictions in life. Despite the peculiarity of the film, given that it follows the lives of heroin addicts, it still really captivated me. It left me wondering about the things the rest of us are addicted to; whether it be nicotine, drugs, social media, food, pleasure, or whatnot, and how each of us chance on overcoming these addictions. The film made me realize that we all have a certain thing in which we are addicted with yet are fully capable of escaping. The lives of the characters showed various problems that came along with their addiction that made them appear to be trapped in such condition. Withdrawal in particular, evidently made it even more difficult to just stop using the drug. This is highly relative to any addiction there is and consequently highlights the fact that we will always tend to go through the worst before finally being able to be free from our addictions that chains us from living the life that are meant to serve our essential being well. Definitely, in spite of these problems, the film excellently revealed that life itself comes with numerous challenges in which it is always up to us whether we choose to continue to strive on. This lesson that I gained from the movie really stuck with me and gave me a better perspective in dealing with various obstacles I will come across with in life.

It’s interesting how drug addiction is portrayed in different cultures, but the stories of it seem to all end the same tragic way. Victims of drug addiction are often seen as good-for-nothing outcasts in most cultures. Although drug usage can be portrayed as “cool” in some places–like in American party scenes–it ultimately becomes a tragic story in the end. Once a person becomes addicted, he or she starts to suffer mental conditions and other health repercussions. In worst cases, drug addiction can take away a person’s life. People begin to comment on the instances in a rather pitiful way: it’s “such a waste” for people to end up like this, and so on.

Drug addiction is a big issue in the Philippines, especially under the political climate brought about by the Duterte administration. He focuses his campaigns on the so-called drug war, and tries to convince people that the most heinous crimes are primarily a result of drugs and addiction. However, this topic was tackled very differently in the film; the characters may be seen as outcasts or ‘good-for-nothing’ people, but in the end, they’re still human. They were written in a way that makes the audience understand where they’re coming from and empathize with them–even if you don’t agree with them.

In the film, Renton tries to stop his addiction and live a new life with a job to be seen as a normal, functioning citizen. He felt as if he were directionless in the life he lived with his friends, who were also drug users, so he moved to London. However, his friends ended up going to his place there and he was influenced back again to the drug culture.

The creativity and production design in the film is amazing, but there was a scene that I couldn’t bear to watch because it was written so revoltingly. It’s the bathroom scene where he “dived” into the toilet bowl of poo to retrieve his heroin. I couldn’t handle seeing that and I realized how powerful visual scenes are to be able to give such an extreme effect.

Another scene that I’d never forget was the baby scene, where he was locked in the room in his parents’ house and he started hallucinating. It was a good highlight of the rhythm of the movie, and the pacing in editing was excellently done. The music matched the scene so perfectly, and it made it such a surreal experience to watch–I felt as if if I were hypnotized.

In the final scene, Renton talked about “the last of the lasts.” We’d start to ask ourselves with just how true that statement is, given the things he did throughout the film–and that’s what we find ourselves guilty of, too. We always say, for example, that this will be the last time we’re cramming, and we would change in the next semester–until we’re graduating and we’re still cramming our last requirement.

The film had a book ending monologue where he talked about choosing life and not choosing life. He mentioned the “normal” things a normal person should have or do: a job, a house, a family, a TV, and all that stuff. It was quite poetic. But we start to ask: who dictates that “life”? Only the privileged could do so. If we’re part of the outliers, we would be antagonized and seen as a problem. After the monologue, I couldn’t help but clap in class. It really hit differently at the end. It’s like we’re being forced into this life, and all we do is to follow the standards set for us. If we couldn’t, we’re out.

Weirdly enough, Trainspotting is not really the kind of movie I would watch. I liked the movie, which is something I did not expect. I felt different kinds of emotions after watching Trainspotting.

Trainspotting has a different take on drug abuse. When we usually talk about drug abuse, it is something that is taken very negatively in our country. Duterte, even when he was still campaigning for presidency, mentioned that he would implement a war on drugs when he becomes president. This, alongside with change, became his trademark. He made a promise that he would eradicate drugs within 3 to 6 months of his term. However, we are now in the third year of his term and, he was actually not true to his words. Or, his promise was not actually doable with his means of eradicating drugs in the country.

Trainspotting shows a different side. It shows how drugs affect a person, how it changes them for the worst. But this does not mean that, there is no chance for the person to become better. Trainspotting allowed us to see that there is, indeed, a chance. It was a long and hard journey for Mark Renton. It was a struggle for him. He knew that he had to stop with doing drugs because it could be the death of him. There were a lot of times in which he started but he eventually failed. This did not stop him from pursuing his goal of not doing drugs anymore. And just when we thought he was finally able to become a person that is “part of society” (a person who has a job and does not rely on drugs anymore), Begbie came into the picture and started ruining his life once more. However, instead of going down with drugs again, he knew better. He prioritized getting his life together. He knew how far he had come and he won’t let a person, let alone Begbie, ruin his progress.

I did not expect the ending of the movie at all. Grabbing the money the group received from a transaction, but he still left a little money for Spud. And unknowingly, I felt a little joy when he did. I couldn’t blame Renton for doing what he did. Begbie and Sick Boy were gonna be the reasons who were gonna bring him down. And after a lot of struggles he had in starting his life all over, he did what he knew could help not only him, but also Begbie, Sick Boy and Spud.

Set in the slums of 90’s Edinburgh, Trainspotting (1996) is Danny Boyle’s portrayal of the addicted lifestyle and the ups and downs that come with it. The colorful and lively backdrop of the big city is strangely apt for this film’s exploration of crime, drug abuse, violence and death. It’s uncomfortable and leaves you with the feeling that it won’t end well, but you stay hooked regardless. Boyle manages take the wide shots, dream-like sequences and awesome soundtrack and make it feel like one long alternative rock music video. I quickly understood why the film is such a cult classic – it speaks to the edgy, dreamy rebellious teen in all of us.

As dark as it is, Boyle manages to inject lighthearted jokes and hilarious scenes that ease audiences’ shock or sadness. Truthfully, it was definitely not comfortable or necessarily easy to watch. There were so many jarring scenes that were difficult to look at and made me want to look away, and for the most part I did. Something about the painful reality of the film was hard to digest, probably because of deadly serious it really can be. The most memorable scene was the death of Allison’s baby. It felt like a huge slap in the face, and I saw the characters feel it too. Apart from the horror that came with recognizing a lost life, I felt a mix of pity and disappointment for the gang, mostly because of how deep into their addiction they really are. I couldn’t believe how quickly they turned back to drugs to numb the pain. It left a sad, bad taste in mouth. It made me want to take a bath right after.

The main character Renton opens and closes the film with the line, “choose life”, and this serves as the main theme for the characters’ individual journeys throughout the film. Renton rides one hell of a rollercoaster while struggling to let go his drug addiction. His friends are no better, and their relationship as a group made me re-evaluate what really constitutes true friendship. Renton, Spud, Sick Boy, Begbie and Tommy all dug holes for themselves and were with each other while they did it. The fact that they were all suffering together offered this sense of community and camaraderie, and they continued to accompany each other in the routine of destroying their lives. The enabled each other, and that was when I realized just how messed up our understanding of friendship and support can be when you’re in a bad place. Doing cool, illegal things together doesn’t make you friends. It makes your life harder. Somewhere along the line I realized that I didn’t actually like the characters or their actions, but I still found myself rooting for them. You see Renton still trying his best to “choose life” by moving away from the druggie lifestyle. His resolve to say goodbye to his abuse, his so-called friends and his unstable life in Edinburgh are something you wish you had, and despite everything he’s done. I didn’t necessarily like Renton, but the fact that he was still alive and capable of making SOME kind of morally charged decisions made me hope for his capacity to grow and move forward.

In the end, we’ll never really know what happens to any of them. We won’t know if Renton will clean up his act. We won’t know if the rest of the boys ever make it out of their own terrible lives. Trainspotting leaves a lot of questions unanswered, but gives us one hell of a ride in the process..

Trainspotting (1996) is not clean-cut or glamorous. It’s gritty, unpurified, and at times, downright disgusting. This works to its advantage, though – it’s a film about drug use and abuse, and follows the pretty much completely messed up lives of Renton (Ewan McGregor), Spud (Ewen Bremner), Sick Boy (Jonny Lee Miller), Tommy (Kevin McKidd) and Begbie (Robert Caryle). But, as Renton reminds us in his opening monologue, this is his choice: “I chose not to choose life: I chose something else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who needs reasons when you’ve got heroin?”

The film tells its story from the inside looking out. It does not feel insincere or sensationalized. It feels real. We see the each character wrestle with a cycle of addiction, convincing themselves that they’re finally going to quit, but eventually giving in and falling back on their habits. When Renton makes the decision to move to London and become a real estate agent, his Edinburgh life creeps up on him, one old friend at a time. When the possibility of a drug deal comes along, Renton’s sobriety is ruined, bringing to light the social aspect of substance abuse. How can you quit, when everyone around you refuses to?

The film effectively illustrates the euphoria of drug use, but does not neglect to show us its consequences. Trainspotting makes you laugh, because it is genuinely funny. But there are tragic scenes, as well – the way that everyone breaks down crying when they find Sick Boy’s deceased child, witnessing Tommy’s death from HIV, and Renton’s arduous withdrawals. Because I didn’t fully connect with any of the characters, I was always just mildly uncomfortable while watching these scenes. I wasn’t sure if I should be sympathizing with them, because they had essentially sabotaged their own lives. These scenes didn’t exactly serve as melancholic breaks from a tumultuous plot. At the heart of each tragedy was an unresolved tension – if these people just put their foot down and made the decision to quit, they could start rebuilding their lives – but Trainspotting continued to prove to us that it’s never going to be as simple as going cold turkey.

Trainspotting showed me a life that was radically different from my own. I highly doubt that anything I experience in the future will even vaguely resemble any of the struggles highlighted in the film, and the director is clearly aware of that. Renton himself tells the audience he’s going to be just like us. It’s chilling in a way I can’t really explain. Many of us can fit into cookie-cutter stereotypes, no matter how hard that is to accept. In the end, we will end up choosing our idea of what exactly an accomplished life entails: “the job, the family, the fucking big television.” This begs the question: who put this idea in our head in the first place? Why do we all resonate with this idea of life so much? How are we sure that this is the right choice, anyway? For me, the film is far from a mere glorification of substance use – it’s definitely not telling us that drugs are the answer to all our problems. In its rawest form, Trainspotting is an unapologetic and chaotic depiction of an all too familiar narrative – young people making bad decisions.