Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2574 in DVD
• Brand: Universal Pictures
• Model: 047 800 2
• Released on: 1996-02-23
• Rating: Suitable for 18 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Full Screen, PAL
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish, French, Dutch
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 89 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
The film that effectively launched the star careers of Robert Carlyle, Ewan McGregor and Jonny Lee Miller is a hard, barbed picaresque, culled from the bestseller by Irvine Welsh and thrown down against the heroin hinterlands of Edinburgh. Directed with abandon by Danny Boyle, Trainspotting conspires to be at once a hip youth flick and a grim cautionary fable. Released on an unsuspecting public in 1996, the picture struck a chord with audiences worldwide and became adopted as an instant symbol of a booming British rave culture (an irony, given the characters' main drug of choice is heroin not ecstasy).

McGregor, Lee Miller and Ewen Bremner play a slouching trio of Scottish junkies; Carlyle their narcotic-eschewing but hard-drinking and generally psychotic mate Begbie. In Boyle's hands, their lives unfold in a rush of euphoric highs, blow-out overdoses and agonising withdrawals (all cued to a vogueish pop soundtrack). Throughout it all, John Hodge's screenplay strikes a delicate balance between acknowledging the inherent pleasures of drug use and spotlighting its eventual consequences. In Trainspotting's world view, it all comes down to a question of choices--between the dangerous Day-Glo highs of the addict and the grey, grinding consumerism of the everyday Joe. "Choose life", quips the film's narrator (McGregor) in a monologue that was to become a mantra. "Choose a job, choose a starter home... But why would anyone want to do a thing like that?" Ultimately, Trainspotting's wised-up, dead-beat inhabitants reject mainstream society in favour of a headlong rush to destruction. It makes for an exhilarating, energised and frequently terrifying trip that blazes with more energy and passion than a thousand more ostensibly life-embracing movies. --Xan Brooks

Special Features
English
Region 2

Synopsis
A kinetic, intimate look inside the subculture of heroin abuse, this acclaimed adaptation of Irvine Welsh's novel follows the misadventures of Renton (Ewan McGregor), a brash twenty-something Edinburgh junkie, and his nihilistic chums Spud (Ewen Bremner), Sick Boy (Jonny Lee Miller), Tommy (Kevin McKidd), and Begbie (Robert Carlyle). Alternately comical and dark, the film ultimately comes down to Renton's choice between self-destruction or life. The stellar soundtrack should not be missed.

Customer Reviews

style over substance
as someone from Edinburgh who lived and went to plenty of the places mentioned in Trainspotting i have to say read the book the book instead which has the full content and message rather than just a comic short hand for what was happening at the time. It made fashionista fools think that taking hard drugs was a nice activity and gave them kudos and brought in too many people too Edinburgh looking for that lifestyle.
I have never managed it all the way through and think it is just an alternative advert for Britain for the naively trendy or people who misguided enough to think that the pathos and dark humor wasn't there to balance the story...great cast though and on the whole well acted but an overrated footnote to late 90's Britain

champion stuff
Trainspotting caught a nations breath when it was released in 1996,it felt when i look back that the entire world had seen it and not only enjoyed it,but learnt the script,picked up the phrases and gave the film a success that few in the studio at the time would have predicted,the soundtrack sold like hotcakes,people picked their character in the film that they admired and this film was as much an icon of the 90s as cds,oasis and four weddings and a funeral to name just a few.
Twelve of so years have passed and you are indeed entitled to ask if this film has aged,after watching it for the first time in a while the other day i am happy to say it hasnt,none of its initial magic has been lost,granted i wasnt obsessed with this at the time,i liked it and that soundtrack had no appeal for a lad like me but this is a great film adapted from a book i havent read but can assume it isnt bad.
The film deals with the harshest of drugs,heroin and how it affects a key number of players and those around them,the film is lively,nasty,comical and trippy,all things that you would expect,it is a film that just works on many levels and came into the world at a time that felt right,much like lock ,stock and two smoking barrels which was released two years later,this is a great and dare i say vital film.

one of the best films!
One of my all time favourite films, although I haven't bothered to watch any of the extras.