Trainspotting [Blu-ray] [Criterion Collection]

Director: Danny Boyle Danny Boyle

Overview

A controversial, blackly comic view of the life of heroin addict Mark Renton (Ewan McGregor) and the group of junkies, deadbeats, thieves, liars, and psychopaths who he calls friends. Renton is a clever, witty anit-hero, who consciously chooses the life of a junkie over the utter boredom of everything else. While getting the squalor and degradation of the junkie lifestyle down to the last grotesque detail, Trainspotting also captures the way drugs give structure and meaning to otherwise aimless lives, and describes, in detail, the breathtaking rapture of a fix. Director Danny Boyle shows himself to be a unique talent, in this stunning and at times revolting follow-up to his earlier success Shallow Grave. Much of the success of the film is due to the performance of Ewan McGregor, who is both charming and repellant in the role of Mark. McGregor deftly plays the unrepentant Mark as he tells his story, and shows the same comic flair that he did in Shallow Grave. Danny Boyle challenges his audience as Mark explains his chosen lifestyle, but does not apologize for it, and it is this nonjudgmental stance that gives the film its power. The audience is asked neither to approve of Mark nor to emulate him. Boyle simply tells Mark's story, brutal, funny and loathsome as it can be, leaving the moralizing to be done by others.

Product Details

Release Date:	01/30/2024
UPC:	0715515291712
Original Release:	1996
Source:	Criterion Collection
Language:	English
Time:	1:34:00
Sales rank:	3,719

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Ewan McGregor	Mark Renton
Ewen Bremner	Spud
Jonny Lee Miller	Sick Boy
Kevin McKidd	Tommy
Robert Carlyle	Begbie
Kelly Macdonald	Diane,Flat Buyer
Peter Mullan	Swanney
James Cosmo	Mr. Renton
Eileen Nicholas	Mrs. Renton
Susan Vidler	Allison
Pauline Lynch	Lizzy
Shirley Henderson	Gail
Stuart McQuarrie	Gavin, U.S. tourist
Irvine Welsh	Mikey,Sheriff
Dale Winton	Game Show Host
Keith Allen	Dealer,Andreas
Annie Louise Ross	Gail's Mother,Man 1
Billy Riddoch	Gail's Father
Fiona Bell	Diane's Mother
Vincent Friel	Diane's Father
Victor Eadie	Man 2
Kate Donnelly	Woman
Eddie Nestor	Estate Agent
Vincent Friell	Diane's Father
Tom Delmar	Pub Heavy
John Kazek	Actor
Rachael Fleming	Renton's Nurse
Damon Albarn	Composer

Technical Credits

John Hodge

Danny Boyle	Director,Producer
John Hodge	Screenwriter
Andrew Macdonald	Producer
Terry Forrestal	Stunts
Grant Mason	Special Effects
Andy Pryor	Casting
Tony Steers	Special Effects
Gail Stevens	Casting
Martin Cantwell	Sound Effects
Ray Merrin	Sound Effects
Bernard Bellew	Producer
Tony Cook	Sound Effects
Perry Costello	Special Effects
Tom Delmar	Stunts
Ray Merrin	Sound/Sound Designer
Mark Taylor	Sound/Sound Designer
Colin Nicolson	Sound/Sound Designer
Brian Saunders	Sound/Sound Designer