Trainspotting is a 1996 Academy Award-nominated, BAFTA-winning cult classic film directed by Danny Boyle based on the novel Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh. The movie is about a group of heroin addicts in late 1980s Edinburgh and their passage through life. It stars Ewan McGregor as Mark Renton, Ewen Bremner as Spud, Jonny Lee Miller as Sick Boy, Kevin McKidd as Tommy, Robert Carlyle as Begbie and Kelly Macdonald as Dianne. Author Irvine Welsh also has a brief appearance as hapless drug dealer Mikey Forrester.

The screenplay, by John Hodge, was adapted from Welsh's novel. It does not contain any references to the non-drug-related hobby of train spotting. The title is a reference to an episode in the original book (not included in the film) where Begbie and Renton meet "an auld drunkard" in the disused Leith Central railway station, which they are visiting to use as a toilet. He asks them, in a weak attempt at a joke, if they are "trainspottin'". As they walk away, Renton realizes the drunk was Begbie's father (p309, Minerva edition).

A wild, freeform, Rabelaisian trip through the darkest recesses of Edinburgh low-life, focusing on Mark Renton and his attempt to give up his heroin habit, and how the latter affects his relationship with family and friends: Sean Connery wannabe Sick Boy, dimbulb Spud, psycho Begbie, 14-year-old girlfriend Diane, and clean-cut athlete Tommy, who's never touched drugs but can't help being curious about them... Written by Michael Brooke

A group of disaffected Scottish youths turn to heroin to escape the banalities of modern-day existence. Then, they begin to suffer the consequences and discover that there are no easy solutions to the inherent loneliness and pain of life. Written by Tad Dibbern