TRAINSPOTTING Screens at The St. Louis Public Library June 25th

“We called him Mother Superior on account of the length of his habit.”

TRAINSPOTTING screens at The St. Louis Public Library Central Branch (1301 Olive Street St. Louis) Saturday, June 25th at 1pm. This is a FREE event. 

There’s a new film series in town! To celebrate the Summer Reading Program theme, “Worlds of Wonder,” Central Cinema at the St. Louis Library will be screening some of the most unique and fantastical films ever shown on the big screen. The series kicks off this Saturday with Danny Boyle’s  TRAINSPOTTING

Probably the most disgusting thing I can imagine doing is swimming through a dirty toilet, in search of a pill I had just put up my own butt. Good thing TRAINSPOTTING (1996) took care of showing me that on the silver screen. Despite how disgusting that scene is, TRAINSPOTTING is a master piece. TRAINSPOTTING balances brilliantly the duality between straight people, drug addicts, and alcoholics with a holier than thou attitude toward illegal addicts, touching in depth upon the stresses of a druggie lifestyle, while never falling too far away from the whimsical nature of the film to make a joke out of place.

If you’ve ever had an angry moment, you’ll love Francis Begbie (Robert Carlyle). His raw, inappropriate rage is comical because you get to see it from the outside.

If you’ve ever had a moment of doubt, you’ll love Mark Renton (Ewan McGregor). He’s the perennial introspective psychologist, keenly aware of his condition, struggling with whether he wants his lifestyle, always laughingly dry about it.

If you’ve ever had a ‘bad’ friend, you’ll love Sick Boy (Jonny Lee Miller). He’s pushy, disloyal, always right, always wrong, but you can’t get away from him.

If you’ve ever had a naive friend, you’ll love Spud (Ewen Bremner). His weakness makes him ever funnier as the movie goes on, particularly in the speed addled job interview scene, which is a comedic gem. Everything Spud does in TRAINSPOTTING makes me laugh, even though I can’t understand a word he says.

TRAINSPOTTING pushes you to new places, and you’ll beg to keep going. It’s raw, witty, and twenty years later, still undeniably compelling. See it when it screens this Sunday, June 24^th at The St. Louis Library (1301 Olive Street St. Louis, Missouri 63103) There is free parking available on the parking lot at 15^th & Olive through July 23.

Here’s the line-up for the rest of the summer. All films are screened Saturdays at 1pm and all are FREE

July 2: Edward Scissorhands, PG-13, 105 mins., Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp.

July 9: Ghostbusters, PG, 105 mins., Columbia Pictures

July 23: Star Wars: The Force Awakens, PG-13, 136 mins., Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

August 6: The Good, the Bad & the Ugly, NR, 179 mins., United Artists

August 13: Taxi Driver, R, 113 mins., Columbia Pictures

August 27: Blue Velvet, PG-13, 120 mins., De Laurentiis