Guess What Sucks

     I saw Trainspotting 3 or 4 times in the theatre when It was first released.  I was a teenager at the time,  and the idea of drugs I knew nothing about… mixed with thick accents from countries I’d never been to… along with a cool soundtrack, seemed irresistible to me.   Boy was I a young stupid fool.  Trainspotting is a huge pile of cinematic shit… and it Sucks.

   I’ll give a High-Five to Danny Boyle for his style… which is better used and easily more enjoyable in other films he has directed, including “Shallow Grave”… “28 Days Later”… “Millions” and ”Sunshine”.  Trainspotting starts nowhere and ends nowhere.  I understand its based on the best selling book by Irvine Welsh and I am not saying that the book sucks.  This MOVIE sucks.  It is a baseless and shameless exercise in style and slick movie making over story and substance.  

    I was fascinated by the characters.  All of them.  But then I thought… “Huh.  If these drug addicts had southern accents and were addicted to crystal meth instead of the then sheik and popular heroin… would it be as entertaining?  Probably not.”  So the movie relies on the almost incidental fact of the actors accents and their style to appear cool and interesting.  Think if Trainspotting had a bluegrass soundtrack instead of the euro trashy seIections in the film.  Still as cool????    I know that some people might say… “Hey Danny Anus!!!   If you change any 2 or 3 things in a film… then its going to be different, and possibly not as good!!!!”   I understand that.   A lot of things are all in the details,  but in this case… Trainspotting comes across as dated as a pair of Doc Martens and a flannel shirt worn together.  It is these THREE details that trick people into thinking its a good motion picture.

      It was released in 1996… at the height of Heroin Hype.  Sure the movie has an anti drug message overall… but MAN do those motherfuckers look cool being addicted to it. See even the nastiest and skankiest Scotsman or Brit has the potential for being cool.  Its all in the accent.  Oh its so tragic when the plot unfolds too; drugs addicts take too many drugs and people die.  People cry.  People get lost in their addictions.  Really?  I was unaware that hard core narcotics could do that to people.  Take away the accents and the music… and its a rather boring and mundane story that you could catch on the Lifetime Network (which sucks too).

Some might say that the overall message is about friendship and how drugs and money can affect them.  Well another big fucking surprise there.  I never thought that drug addicts would fuck each other over for money and their habits.  But as long as Lou Reed and Iggy Pop are involved… then its AMAZING right?  Wrong.  Ask ANYONE why this movie is good… and Ill bet you everything from a diddle-eyed Joe to a damned-if-I-know, that they cant do it without using the words “Cool” or ”Soundtrack”.

Which leads me to my last point.  The whole fucking movie plays like a 90 minute music video.  Every 10 minutes there’s another quick paced scene set to some hip cool tunes by music’s elite.  Its like the director decided to tap into the market of short attention spans to make this hapless piece of crapp fly right.  I am NOT saying that cool music in a film makes it suck.  That is stupid.  Cool music can sometimes MAKE a movie great.   But cool music being the fucking cornerstone of a movies character does nothing but make the movie a stylistic hodge podge that makes for boring viewing after its been watched a couple of times.  It makes the movie a trick to the senses.  It fools you into thinking its good… when in reality, it Sucks.

So lets see… Heroin Hype+Foreign accents+Cool Soundtrack = SUCKS.  Yeah that’s about right.