Research on Trainspotting

Trainspotting, the first novel written by Irving Welsh in 1993 was to be published by Secker & Warburg.
The plot of the film is of a group of friends that are regular heroin abusers. All throughout the book and film, we see that they all try to curb their ways with not much luck and try to turn their life away from the problems they have created for them selves. This novel come film is set in the Scottish city of Edinburgh in the mid 1980’s.
However, the title relates to obsessive behavior, in this case; drug addicts obsess about getting their next fix just as train spotters obsess about collecting train numbers. Or a slang term meaning to inject heroin or to "Mainline" it.
Once we look past the drug addictions, other recurring themes in the film are shown. For example, the urban poverty and squalor in the culturally rich Edinburgh. The film has developed a mass of cults which make up today’s society whether it be young teenagers to senior adults.
The types of genre we know this film as is associated with is crime, drama and comedy. We see the crime when the group of friends starts to take the drugs, sell them and commenting theft. We see drama with the way they are dealing with their individual problems, like the loss of a child or mending a broken heart. The consequences of their actions have cost them their lives. And we finally see comedy with the lead character and narrator’s cheap but witty sarcasm. He describes the feeling of wanting, taking and recovering from his heroin addiction. With this we also see the surreal hallucinations he gets from quitting the drug with horrific and rather graphic images.
The film was directed by multi Oscar award winner Danny Boyle (Slum dog Millionaire, Shallow Grave). The films screen play was written by John Hodge (The Final Curtain, Alien Love Triangle). The film was filmed in some of the Scottish highlands and some parts in England’s busiest cities, London.
There were only four companies that took charge of covering financial aid and producing the film as well as helped distributing it. These are Channel Four Films (now known as Film Four Productions), Figment Films, Polygram Filmed Entertainment and The Noel Gay Motion Picture Company.
The novel was long listed for the booker prize in 1993; however, the novel was turned down for the short list because it was argued that it “offended two female judges’ sensibilities”. The film version of the bestselling novel was nominated for an Oscar and won BAFTA’s for best film, screenplay, actor, actress, director and producer. The film was also ranked 10th spot by the BFI (British Film Institute) in its list of top 100 films of all time.