T2 TRAINSPOTTING, Twenty-One Years After, with the ORIGINAL ENSEMBLE CAST

USPA NEWS - 'T2 Trainspotting' is a 2017 British black comedy drama film, set in and around Edinburgh, Scotland. It is a sequel to 1996's 'Trainspotting', twenty-one years on from the original film, and twenty-one years on in the lives of the main characters....

'T2 Trainspotting' is a 2017 British black comedy drama film, set in and around Edinburgh, Scotland. It is a sequel to 1996's 'Trainspotting', twenty-one years on from the original film, and twenty-one years on in the lives of the main characters. Trainspotting was the ultimate ode to the Brit-Pop, Rule Brittania 90s, with an iconic soundtrack and a “˜choose life´ poster that graced the walls of every young adult of the era. You can´t recreate your past, but you can relive it in your head over and over again, seeing it differently as you become someone new each year, month, week and day.

Directed by : Danny Boyle
Produced by : Bernard Bellew, Danny Boyle, Christian Colson, Andrew Macdonald
Screenplay by : John Hodge
Based on : 'Trainspotting' and 'Porno' by Irvine Welsh
Starring : Ewan McGregor, Ewen Bremner, Jonny Lee Miller, Robert Carlyle
Distributed by : TriStar Pictures
Running time : 117 minutes
Release date : 22 January 2017 (Edinburgh), 27 January 2017 (United Kingdom), 01 March 2017 (France)
Country : United Kingdom

THE STORY

The sequel checks in with the unmoored but largely lovable characters from the first movie as they face middle age. Ewan McGregor is back as the lead character, Mark 'Rent Boy' Renton, perhaps best remembered for his visit in the first film to the 'Worst Toilet in Scotland.' Robert Carlyle appears as Francis 'Franco' Begbie, who starts brawls with almost anyone who crosses his path ; Ewen Bremner returns as the dimwitted Daniel 'Spud' Murphy, who, in the first movie, has a memorable job interview while high on speed ; and Jonny Lee Miller is back as Simon 'Sick Boy' Williamson, now known as Simon.

Twenty-one years on from the original film, and twenty-one years on in the lives of the main characters, Mark Renton returns to Edinburgh from his life in Amsterdam. Visiting the city he thought he had left behind when he ran out on his friends, two decades previously with a bag of cash, he wants to make amends in some way for what those intervening years have done to them all. He seeks out Spud to whom life hasn´t been kind in an altogether more devastating way, and he reconnects with Sick Boy who is now running a blackmail and prostitution racket with business partner Veronika (Anjela Nedyalkova). The missing piece of the jigsaw is Begbie who´s still seething about being stitched up by Renton all those years ago and who's stuck in jail...

Begbie purposefully hospitalises himself and subsequently escapes, taking advantage of the low security. He briefly reunites with his wife and son, and visits Simon who is feigning friendship with him as his ulterior motive, pretending to collaborate with Begbie, who is still out for revenge against Mark. While on the run, Begbie begins burgling houses, taking along his son Frank Jr, who he sees as a chip off the old block, while Frank Jr's aspirations lie in attending college. Renton tries to find a way to heal the wounds, and maybe make some money with Sick Boy´s latest scam. Nostalgic for the past, angry at the present, and disillusioned by the future, Renton and his friends must find a way to be alright...

OUR REVIEW

Like the original, “˜T2 Trainspotting´ is a winning mix of low living and high jinx, a stylized spin on real life. What remains to be seen is how much Sick Boy´s unifying theory of life applies to the Trainspotting gang. As with the original, it´s Spud who exemplifies the tragedy of a time that moves by too quickly, and leaves many stranded on platforms unable to find the wherewithal to buy a ticket and board a train to the promised future. Sick Boy is scamming his way through life. Begbie still stands, as he always did, an ode to toxic masculinity and lashing out at everyone who stands in his way.

Against all of this, Renton is still our everyman, standing on the fence with total oblivion on one side, and possible redemption on the other. Also, showing us the aging face of a man who never thought enough about the future to actually imagine himself in it. We have to salute Danny Boyle for doing something much more interesting than delivering a straight-up cash-in or nostalgia fest... It is an oddly haunting experience, strange and sad, to see these faces again... Much older, more lined, less carefree.

Ruby BIRD
http://www.portfolio.uspa24.com/
Yasmina BEDDOU
http://www.yasmina-beddou.uspa24.com/