Screen Scene
by John Carlos Cantú
[1996. Directed by Danny Boyle. Cast: Ewan McGregor, Ewen Bremner, Jonny Lee Miller. Miramax Films/Miramax Home Video. 93 mins.] f
Trainspotting is what A Clockwork Orange might have been if Stanley Kubrick had learned to dance during the swinging '60s.
Danny Boyle, director of 1995's Siafow Grave, takes on Kubrick's punk vision of tomorrow with a little post-modern ultra-violence. Boyle's Trainspotting crafts a kinder, more gentle vision of what nihilism cum anarchism can be for the dazed and confused '90s.
Scottish generation-Xsoul mates Mark Renton (Ewan McGregor), Spud (Ewen Bremner), and Sick Boy (Jonny Lee Miller), have too much fun going for them with their assorted bad habits to care much about whatever else is lacking in their motley lives. They and two other friends - the thoroughly likable Tommy (Kevin McKidd), who eventually succumbs to AIDS through a dirty needle, and alcoholic psychopath, Begbie (Robert Cariyle) - slob aimlessly around Edinburgh moving from flophouse to flophouse in search of the perfect high.
What's more - and this, of course, is what's so scandalous to the bourgeoisie - they actually like their petty thievery, random muggings, and assorted tomfooleries.
So save the M.B.A.S and hold the charitable donations. Trainspotting's varied addicts are rebels with a cause. Somewhat like Matt Dillon's brain-numbed Bob in Gus Van Sant's earlier Drugstore Cowboy, this flirtation with drug addiction is supposed to be a profession in lieu of a career track.
And just like Van Sant's earlier eulogy to self inflicted pathos, once Trainspotting settles itself down, it turns into a fairly routine caper flick. The good (namely, Tommy) die young - a clear warning to all those potentially impressionable out-of-it little wannabes - and the film finally gets down to business when Begbie tells his four pals he's accidentally fallen into a stash of primo heroin. Sick Boy knows an organized gang that will quadruple its worth, so it's off to London where he, Renton, Spud, and Begbie are in for the score of their misbegotten lives.
So much for fab fours, countercultures, and the inevitable disintegration of society that Kubrick cinematically predicted in the early '70s. When these junkies come to the dim realization that what they need is a really new drug - and it turns out to be no more than filthy lucre - we're right back where we started from. The editing might be a bit more ragged, and the personal stakes might be slightly higher, but it's hard to create a newly coined blissed-out worldview when the soundtrack's dominated by a vaguely pre-post-apocalyptic dissonance warbled by now establishment geezers like David Bowie, Iggy Pop, and Lou Reed.
The harmless (by comparison) Jerry Maguire's often quoted catch-phrase of the year is "Show me the money!" Well, okay. But it takes Renton's scabrous betrayal of his erstwhile friends - in both economic and hypodermic terms - to take this flimsy premise to the bank.
The surprising upshot of Trainspotting is that despite its infantile orgy of narcotics, and its supposedly shocking lífestyle abuse, the film is actually quite riveting in a not-too-convincing fashion. lts narrative is a little too predictably conventional for its self-congratulatory iconoclasm.
After all, how anarchistic can any film be that goes straight from its hipped-up hard core mainline to a conformist-tinged commercial money line through a simple-minded fade-out?
THE GODFATHER
[1972. Directed by Francis Ford Coppola. Cast: Marión Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan. Paramount Pictures Paramount Home Video. English and Italian with English subtitles. 175 mins.]
Perhaps it's because The Godfather unfolds at such a leisurely neo-realist pace - unlike the manic jump-cutting and flash editing that was the rage of the 1970s - that Francis Ford Coppola's masterpiece maintains its reputation. But then again, the same claim could be made for its superb method acting; bravura directing; chiaroscuro cinematography ; and romantic music. T
he film is indeed a classic. And unlike some trendy films - for example, and alarmingly enough, even films as relatively recent as Pulp Fiction or New Jack City - The Godfather has fully retained its considerable power.
Chalk up this freshness to Coppola's tremendous psychological insight into this submerged milieu of capitalism. Ostensibly a metaphor for the quintessential American success story, The Godfather traces the effects of Vito Corleone's relentless foray into crime. A soft-spoken, shy man whose love for his family is evident in his public behavior; Corleone, as played by Marión Brando, is nonetheless, a ruthless 1 940s criminal padrone whose flick of a wrist or scarcely raised eyebrow can raise havoc in whole segments of New York City.
Corleone's strict Sicilian code of honor rules his family as firmly as he ably controls his ill gotten empire. And his children - hot-headed Sonny (James Caan), weak-willed Fredo (John Cázale), dominated Connie (Talia Shire), and soft-spoken Michael (Al Pacino) - have all been misshapen by his remarkably fierce determination to pass his fortune to his heirs.
Into this questionable World War II era success story steps in fellow mobster, Virgil "the Turk" Sollozzo (Al Lettieri). Sollozzo proposes to introduce narcotics into the city's underworld to open new territory for the mob while also checking the influence of non-ltalian gangsters. Of these criminal masterminds, Corleone alone rejects the proposal. Not because he's civic minded, but because of the impact drugs will have on his political patronage and numbers racket.
Unfortunately, all things must pass, and Don Vito Corleone finds himself the victim of a botched assassination attempt. Sonny takes the Corieone "family" into his hands until his outrage is quelled by another mobster hit. Finally, young Ivy-league educated Michael must try to salvage the family 's fortunes despite his father' s attempt to shield him from the family business.
The balance of the film follows Michael's ruthless consolidation of power even as he struggles to find his moral balance in a profession that doesn't allow for much of a conscience. The greatness of Coppola's and novelist Mario Puzo's Oscar-winning screenplay lies in this elevation of tawdry behavior to the level of moral tragedy.
It could also be said that The Godfather, too, elevated the popular crime story genre to the level of high art. Comparing this film to the previous year"s Oscar-winning Best Picture, The French Connection, which was also set in New York City, shows the startling shift Coppola permanently made of this genre. Indeed, it's not too much to say that quite a substantial number of current motion picture talents - from actors and actresses to directors, screenwriters, and technicians - wouldn't have their place in Hollywood today without this single motion picture.
It's a testimony to the film's brill lance that The Godfather has aged as handsomely as it has. The film resonates with a venomous logic from Brando's extraordinary turn as the seemingly benign, but inwardly vicious, Vito, to Pacino's extraordinary transition from patriotic war hero into no nonsense Mafia businessman. Just as, equally, from James Caan's short turn as chief caporegime, Sonny, to Robert Duvall's coldly legal consigliere, Torn Hagen, this logic is ironically undercut by Niño Rotas mock-sentimental musical score and Gordon Willis' luscious cinematography.
The Godfather made a deal with America that it couldn't refuse in 1972. And in one way or another, we haven't stopped dealing with it since.