by Nathan Brown
It’s around 2045 on a busy Fringe Friday in Edinburgh that I find myself trying to find the Leith Theatre, hurtling down Leith Walk, somewhere I’ve been several times before without realising quite how long it is. The stakes might not be quite as high as during the opening chase sequence of Trainspotting, the movie I’m in a hurry to see and celebrate, but currently it doesn’t feel like that and in the end an Uber is ordered to make sure we arrive in time, if not quite on time. I step out the car, wrangle through my emails to find the tickets and head into the theatre, the hustle and bustle and accompanying adrenaline still with me as I’m handed a bright orange bucket hat with the words ‘CHOOSE LIFE’ emblazoned on it in white text. This already doesn’t feel like a usual Friday night screening and given that the film is to be accompanied by a cast and crew commentary and followed by a Trainspotting themed rave, it probably isn’t meant to. The floor of the theatre is all standing, given that there is to be a rave immediately after the movie and the queues for the bars at the back of the room meld seamlessly with the back rows of spectators. Eventually, about ten minutes after the expected screening time, the lights go down, I grip an overpriced (but locally made) tin of gin and tonic in each hand and prepare to watch a film I have probably seen a hundred times before.
I’ve travelled to Edinburgh and to this theatre for a 30th anniversary screening of Trainspotting and as I’m 34 myself, the film has been around for the bulk of my life, although it will come as no surprise I didn’t see it as a 4 year old. My first viewing came probably a decade after it’s release, just as I was reaching the age where the off limit VHS tapes in the house were slowly becoming accessible to me. I used to sit and peer at these videos, reading the blurbs and looking at the artwork, trying to imagine what they could be about and whether or not I would be as obsessed by them when the time finally came for me to see them. I always found the Trainspotting case absolutely impenetrable, the five key cast members looked vaguely threatening as they peered or leered at me in black and white from the front cover and I remember reading the synopsis time and time again, still finding myself at a loss as to what the 93 minutes could contain. When I finally did see it, I realised I could have spent another 10 years looking at the case and guessing and probably still wouldn’t have got anywhere near it but also knew that I would probably spend those years now examining every scene and frame as carefully as I had that VHS case.
It became a film that I would watch every night. A few other formative films had preceded it in capturing my attention enough to be included in this ritual; The Mummy, Donnie Darko and The Rocky Horror Picture Show, but in some ways Trainspotting stood out even from those. It was Scottish, and through that connection alone it spoke to me – but it was more than that. Through Ewan McGregor’s ‘Mark Renton’ I was presented with a view of Scotland, morality and well, life in general, that seemed so head strong in its rebellion and its desire to avoid the norms which was hugely appealing to the teenage brain. It showed me the nuance of friendship. the damage of ego and expectation within a group of peers and how some bonds can become so strong that they might need to be broken. But I didn’t realise all that at the time, I was too busy making Irvine Welsh’s Edinburgh and it’s inhabitants my entire personality, going overboard with this at one point and introducing myself to a new group of people (in Edinburgh of all places) as ‘Sick Boy’ (given the abhorrent things that this characters says and does in Trainspotting and other associated works this was an incredibly questionable choice but we do not pretend to understand the teenage brain) to which I was met with a sarcastic reply of ‘Aye and I’m Mark Renton.’
After twenty years of living with these stories and characters, to have an event associated with the film had me so excited. On the morning of the screening the list of contributors to the commentary was announced – cast members Ewan McGregor (Renton), Ewen Bremner (Spud) and Kevin McKidd (Tommy) were joined by Rachael Fleming (costume designer), Kave Quinn (production designer) from the crew along with screenwriter John Hodge, producer Andrew Macdonald and Irvine Welsh himself. Robbie Colin, film critic for The Telegraph would be on hosting duties. The joy of an anniversary screening is getting to experience the film with an audience who share your love for it and in this aspect the screening didn’t disappoint, with a rowdy Friday night crowd responding loudly to the film as it rumbled along, whooping, laughing, shouting out in repulsion at some of the grossest scenes and even joining in with some of the best known lines, including a near-deafening ‘IT’S SHITE BEING SCOTTISH’. Unfortunately this didn’t lend itself very well to the commentary aspect of the event, with a lot of the anecdotes being lost in the noise on the crowd. I did manage to catch an interesting account of how the overdose scene (where Renton sinks into the floor) was shot and the trickery involved but otherwise I was left a bit wanting, and I couldn’t help but think that if there wasn’t a need to cater for the party element of the event after the film, that this would have worked better in an all seated space. With that said, as the cast and crew made their way off the stage and Irvine Welsh stepped behind a set of decks, it was a truly unique feeling to feel the film’s energy be transported from the screen and dumped into the room, as house music began to play and Trainspotting related visuals now took over the screen, while a sea of orange bucket hats bobbed along.
After a night spent celebrating my favourite film with fellow fans and some of the people most involved in bringing it to the screen, I definitely felt my love for it renewed and if nothing else, I had a new hat! However, much like film’s protagonist, I felt like the event overall was stuck trying to figure out quite what it wanted to be – and maybe that was the best way to honour this truly unique movie.
Nathan Brown (Instagram – moodswingsabz) is a freelance writer and (semi)retired podcaster from Aberdeen in the North East of Scotland. His initial work focused on mental health before branching out to genre cinema, football, travel and anything else he can shoehorn himself into.
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