Trainspotting Review PIF

Trainspotting,

Plot

Trainspotting is a film about drug abuse, however unlike many other films that cover drug abuse it never condemns it, the film opens with our core cast: Mark Renton (Rent-Boy), Simon Williamson (Sick-Boy), Daniel Murphy (Spud), as down and out heroin addicts. Our main character Rent-Boy decides to quit heroin cold turkey after witnessing a baby die from neglect in drug den. He moves to London and gets a job but his old life is catching up with him, his old friends now all but spud are hardened criminals offer him a role in a drug deal they intend to make with one of their friends criminal contacts.

Philosophy

This film is nihilistic in essence and opens a dialogue on the dissatisfaction of a generation. This is greatly communicated during the “Choose life” speech, which parallels Kierkegaard’s I saw the meaning of life speech, it trivializes the values that society teaches us to hold dear. We are told to choose a job choose a career and eventually “Choose rotting away at the end of it all, P*****g your last in a miserable home nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish f****d up brats you’ve spawned to replace yourselves”. The film as a whole forces us to question what we should and shouldn’t see value in. We are supposed to avoid drugs particularly heroin in a lot of cases. The film makes drugs an allegory for everything and shows the equally demeaning tasks we go to achieve them and equally disastrous consequences of their pursuit. Things like: Sex, Friendship, and Violence. Perhaps all life is, is a series of highs and distractions that allow us to get through the day. The greatest nihilistic allegory is in the dueling characters of Sickboy and Renton. Nietzsche describes the dichotomy between the active nihilist and the passive nihilist. The passive nihilist or in this case Renton is resigned to the meaningless of existence. Whereas the active nihilist actively tries to destroy the old values. This is showcased in Sickboys transformation after the death of baby Donner. It is at this point where he reinvents himself as a dealer and a pimp. He proudly boasts to his friends on his dishonesty and how given the chance he’d rip them off. The catalyst for Sickboys transformation in baby Donner’s death brings to mind a quote from Arthur Schopenhauer “Mostly it is loss which teaches us about the worth of things”. It is clear that Sickboy upon analyzing the world around him found nothing to value.

Conclusion

Recommending this film is a fairly pointless task, it’s rightfully so is one of the most beloved films of all time. I thought it might be interesting to critique this film in a manner a little off the norm. I love this film and so would Frederick Nietzsche, it’s a fascinating and unrelentingly dark look into: loss, addiction, and nihilism. If for some reason you’re the one person on the planet that still hasn’t seen it, stop being a disappointment to everyone you know and give it a watch.

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