When Your Life’s in the Toilet A person is highly influenced by those around them. Everyone always seems to find a niche and stick with the people in that environment, whether it is a good one or not. Danny Boyle’s 1996 film Trainspotting is a story about a man who is trying to quit drugs, specifically heroin, but is stuck with the wrong crowd of people. His mind in constantly in an acid trip and the film shows us what he sees. The scene in the public bathroom in particular stands out and shows the struggles faced by Mark and his need to get clean through a great narrative style, great Mis-en-Scene, and finally sound; all of which carefully reflects what the character is feeling. The scene is set up directly after the opening of the film where the main character, Mark Renton gives a long dialogue and sets out to find one last hit, or drug use, before quitting heroin cold turkey. He is sorely disappointed when his dealer does not give him heroin, but instead sells him opiate suppositories. As he is walking back home, the opiate suppositories have a severe laxative effect and Mark has to run into a public toilet, known as “the worst toilet in Scotland,” to relieve himself. The words “the worst……in Scotland” are non-diegetic; they are not originally on the door. He goes to the bathroom and does his business but then realizes the drugs he put in his rectum had not dissolved and are now in the toilet. His severe need for drugs is shown when he does not hesitate to reach into the toilet to retrieve the drugs, even though they were not the ones he wanted in the first place. He goes into the toilet head first and ends up in a place that seems like an ocean, where he finds the suppositories. He then swims to the surface and leaves the toilet soaking wet and returns home. Mark Renton gives a wonderful narrative about what he thinks he will be using will be like. He is using a first person narration, which means the main character is speaking to the audience. The dialogue consists of him wanting to use the restroom where it is nice and luxurious, but the actual bathroom he uses is dirty and disgusting. This reflects Renton’s thinking that he deserves only that which is truly awful. In reality what he really deserves is what he gets; a scummy place is what he gets because, at the moment, he is in a low place and is having trouble bettering his life. He is having trouble getting out of the dark and dirty world he lives in even though he constantly yearns for luxury and cleanliness. Mark is so focused on the world of drugs that there is no way he can even begin to work towards a better life, even though it is everything he wants. This struggle between Mark and his drug habit can also be seen with the mise-en-scenes present in this scene. Mis-en-scene is the arrangement of all the visual elements of the scene. To start with, the clip features a full screen view. Something as basic as the type of frame effects what the audience sees. Using full screen shows that everything in the scene is important including the background where you see just how bad the restroom is. They filmmakers wanted their audience to know exactly how awful Mark’s life was and the depths to which he was willing to sink in order to get his next drug fix. The setting is important too. Before Renton enters the restaurant and it does not seem dirty, but then he enters the restroom and the atmosphere completely changes. The restroom helps set up the scene. The audience knows this is not going to pleasant and they also know that the bathroom is symbolic of the depths to which Renton has sunk in his current standing in life. However, the audience sees a whole new world when Renton goes into the toilet; the setting changes again to a relaxed almost blissful tone. In finding his drugs he enters happiness that he will have one last hit. This is reflected in the ocean like setting that his mind sees. The audience also realizes that the drugs he has taken have had no effect on him and then they also see that it is entirely possible for him to be happy without the presence and the effect of drugs to put him in a good mood. This convinces the audience to be on his side for the rest of the movie because he has shown that, though he is human, he is capable of fighting through his problems and making a better life for himself. Another factor in mise-en-scene is the selection of actors. Ewan McGregor was a great selection for the role of Mark Renton. He was younger at the time and less known, so it did not seem like he portrayed fake emotions. Also with the different types of roles McGregor has played, it is obvious that he is a method actor, which is what this film needed. McGregor was able to get into the drug abuser persona and make it look real. The composition of the film shows both tight and loose framing depending on the part of the scene. When Renton is in the Restroom tight framing is used. This shows that he is trapped in the world of drugs, but when the ocean is shown and he gets the pills, it moves to a loose framing; which shows that this last hit was important and we finally are able to gain his freedom from heroin. The lighting is a hard light used in low key way. There are many parts where Renton’s shadow is showing. The lighting gives a darker tone to the way Renton’s life is. There are two colors that were very noticeable in the scene. The brown of the feces and the blue of the water are important elements of what is going on in the mind of Renton. Brown is dirty and gross to him, but when he goes into the toilet and it turns blue he is happy and feels like he has escaped. All of these elements of Mis-en-scene are important for the scene. Along with what has been discussed above, sound is also an important factor in the portrayal of the life of Mark Renton. The sounds in the restroom scene are very important to the meaning behind it. There are both diegetic and non-diegetic sounds. The diegetic sounds are in the restroom part of the scene. When you hear Renton gag because of how dirty the toilet is, the audience really gets a feel of how bad it is in the restroom. Another important sound is the sloshing of the dirty toilet water when his hands are in it. It makes the audience feel like the water is that bad and they feel sorry for this man. The use in this scene of these two sounds also conveys something to the audience. In many other movie scenes there are a lot of background noise and nearly a dozen different sounds all being heard at once? Since this movie uses only two during this scene the audience feels like the room Mark is in is empty of all other human emotion or interaction, it is only him and he is entirely by himself. The audience feels even worse for him because these two lonely sounds are those of gagging and sloshing fecal matter.
The sound turns non-diegetic when he goes into the toilet. Calm, almost ethereal, music is played in the background through outside resources. This is when he is thinks he is swimming in the ocean. The calm sound exhibits that he has escaped the negative place he was in and is now in a place of blissfulness. The soft volume of the music makes the audience realize that he is not actually hearing the music when he is underwater, but it is actually in his own head. This shows the audience that he is truly happy and feels released from the disgusting and filthy world he used to be a part of.
This scene can be examined in many ways. Through narrative, mise-en-scene, and sound, the scene can be interpreted as a person who wants to escape the terrible world he is in and follow a new path. He sees the light at the end of the tunnel, but is facing some obstacles before he reaches his goal of getting clean. The use of these three cinematic properties helps the audience to realize exactly what he is going through and also convince them to support him and care about him throughout the rest of the film.