Exciting, stylish and audacious, Trainspotting was among the most compelling and controversial British films of the 1990's. A wild ride with a group of young men sunk deep into drugs and petty crime, the movie not only doesn't condemn its characters for their habits, it makes clear that they enjoy them (although it stops far short of approving their actions). Mark Renton (Ewan McGregor), a young man with few prospects and fewer ambitions, lives in economically depressed Glasgow. Like most of his friends, Renton is a heroin addict who loves the drug's blissful nothingness; financing his habit also provides excitement and challenges that his life otherwise lacks. Renton's two best friends are also junkies: Sick Boy (Jonny Lee Miller), a snappy dresser obsessed with James Bond, and Spud (Ewan Bremner), a guileless nerd who suggests Pee Wee Herman's debauched cousin. Renton and his pals also hang out with Begbie (Robert Carlyle), a borderline psychotic who loathes junkies even though he drinks like a fish. After one too many brushes with the law, Renton kicks heroin and moves to London, where he finds a job, a flat, and something close to peace of mind. However, Sick Boy, Begbie, and Spud all arrive at his doorstep on the trail of a big score, leading Renton back into drugs and crime. McGregor's Renton was the 1990s answer to Malcolm McDowell's Alex in A Clockwork Orange (1971): thoroughly corrupted but not without morals (however convenient they might be) and displaying a confounding charm and intelligence. The role made Ewan McGregor a star, and Robert Carlyle is so convincing as the lunatic Begbie that it's hard to believe that he was also the nice guy trying to make a buck in The Full Monty. Director Danny Boyle's acrobatic camera provides the action that the characters avoid and keeps the episodic plot moving forward. This film is not for the squeamish or easily offended.