While You Wait for ‘28 Years Later,' Danny Boyle’s Heartbreaking 90% Rotten Tomatoes Dark Comedy Hits Streaming Soon

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Trainspotting

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Sick Boy, played by Jonny Lee Miller, and Renton, played by Ewan McGregor, sit on the ground

Image via TriStar Pictures

By the time they joined forces for Trainspotting, filmmaker Danny Boyle and leading man Ewan McGregor had already worked alongside one another in Boyle’s feature-length directorial debut, Shallow Grave. Rejoining forces on the adaptation of Irvine Welsh’s 1993 novel of the same name would prove to be an excellent decision for both parties, with the title remaining a classic piece of beloved cinema almost 30 years later. In the new year, Paramount+ is inviting audiences to tune in for the 90% Certified Fresh Rotten Tomatoes movie when it arrives on the platform on January 1.

It’s difficult to fully encompass the deepest pits of addiction-based despair while also keeping a certain amount of levity, but Trainspotting somehow manages to do both. Unlike other addiction-centered movies like Requiem for a Dream and Candy, there are plenty of sequences throughout Boyle’s film that will – at the very least – push a smile across your face or even force a chuckle before diving back into the incredibly dark vibes. Centering on McGregor’s Mark, the movie follows a group of friends struggling to make ends meet in the economically slumped area of Edinburgh during the mid ‘90s. For the most part, the company that Mark keeps are fellow heroin addicts, living day in and out in hopes of scoring their next high. Throughout the movie, Mark makes multiple pushes towards sobriety, while also attempting to wind up in a better financial standing.

The Legacy of ‘Trainspotting’

Joining McGregor to fill out the ensemble case of Trainspotting is a lineup that includes Ewen Bremner (The Rundown), Kevin McKidd (Grey’s Anatomy), Jonny Lee Miller (Hackers), Kelly Macdonald (No Country for Old Men), and Robert Carlyle (The Full Monty). Taking off like wildfire, the drug-fueled nightmarish tale was an immediate hit both in the U.K., as well as across the pond in the U.S. Earning award after award, the movie picked up two BAFTA nominations, as well as an Academy Award nomination for the work done by screenplay writer, John Hodge, who adapted the project to its feature-length capacity from Welsh’s original novel.

While both McGregor and Boyle have gone on to continue nothing short of incredible and wildly successful careers, Trainspotting marks a time when both men were just finding their feet in the industry. As mentioned, even after nearly three decades, the gritty drama is still considered to be an iconic piece of cinema, with a sequel titled T2 Trainspotting arriving in cinemas in 2017. It’s tough for a sequel to live up to an original movie in any case, especially when it's loved to the level that Trainspotting is, but Boyle’s follow-up did just that, even earning a critics’ approval rating of 81% on Rotten Tomatoes.

Find out where the story began when Trainspotting arrives on Paramount+ on January 1.

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Heroin addict Mark Renton (Ewan McGregor) stumbles through bad ideas and sobriety attempts with his unreliable friends -- Sick Boy (Jonny Lee Miller), Begbie (Robert Carlyle), Spud (Ewen Bremner) and Tommy (Kevin McKidd). He also has an underage girlfriend, Diane (Kelly Macdonald), along for the ride. After cleaning up and moving from Edinburgh to London, Mark finds he can't escape the life he left behind when Begbie shows up at his front door on the lam, and a scheming Sick Boy follows

Release Date August 9, 1996

Runtime 93 minutes

Writers John Hodge

Budget $1.5 million

Studio(s) MiraMax

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