T2 a triumphant return
T2: Trainspotting (R16, 117mins)
You know what it’s like when you’re about to catch up with an old friend you haven’t seen in years and you’re worried things might be a bit weird? But then you meet up and everything’s cool – just like old times.
That’s kind of how T2: Trainspotting feels. Granted, it’s been more than a few years – about 21, in fact - since we last hung out with Mark Renton, Sick Boy, Spud and Begbie, but it’s still a hell of a lot of fun.
Time hasn’t been all that kind to the gang. After pledging to ‘‘choose life’’ at the end ofTrainspotting, Renton (Ewan McGregor) has cleaned up his act and started over in Amsterdam. For reasons not entirely clear, he decides to head back home to Edinburgh and track down the mates he ripped off 20 years ago.
Meanwhile, Sick Boy aka Simon (Jonny Lee Miller) has traded his heroin habit for cocaine and is still running scams, as well as a rundown pub, with his prostitute/business partner Veronika (Anjela Nedyalkova).
Begbie (Robert Carlyle), who’s been stuck behind bars, appears to have more rage than ever - including a major grudge against Renton. And poor, hapless Spud (Ewen Bremner) still can’t kick the ‘‘skag’’, despite his best efforts.
Gone are the wild 20-something addicts who didn’t give a crap about anything and in their place is a group of messed-up middleaged men full of regrets.
Nostalgia is the name of the game in T2, but it’s anything but twee when delivered in director Danny Boyle’s fast-paced, downand-dirty style. Although it lacks some of the 1996 film’s edginess, T2 offers more layers to these characters, with Boyle weaving in clips from their childhood, as well as flashbacks from the first film, to show just how far back these friendships go.
Like the original, T2 manages to be dark, funny, cringe-worthy and melancholy all at the same time. Returning screenwriter John Hodge, drawing on Irvine Welsh’s original 1993 novel as well the 2002 follow-up Porno, delivers the same bleak view of life through older, if not necessarily wiser, eyes, which will likely hit home with fans who have also grown up and left behind the hedonism of their youth.
Clearly, T2 won’t have the same shock value or impact as the iconic first film; really, how could it? But it’s a worthy tribute, as well as a highly entertaining film in its own right. – Christina Kuntz