"T2: trainspotting 2"

Sony Pictures

Hollywood's statute of limitations on sequels, reboots, prequels, spinoffs, and remakes seems to be virtually non-existent these days. Hell, cruising down a bustling boulevard in Los Angeles, you might expect to find several billboards, each serving up back-to-back hits of '80s and '90s-charged nostalgia like it was some sort of twisted buffet no one asked for — on Sunset alone, I observed a series of successive 14' x 48' advertisements, each more garish and unappealing than the last, for time-honored film and TV fare such as "Beauty and The Beast" (originally released 26 years ago), "The Power Rangers" (released 24 years ago), "Fargo" (21 years ago), "Baywatch" (28 years ago), and "Ghost in The Shell" (22 years ago). All on the proverbial chopping block — I felt like I was suddenly transported to a Robin Williams "Jumanji" meme asking myself what year it was (oh, and did I mention that film is also getting a reboot?) Righteous American audiences don't agree on much anymore, but while we love to sit on our collective high horse and shout at the rafters over Hollywood's lack of ideas, we really have no one to blame but ourselves. After all, we gorge on loads of half-bred conceptions like cheap cups of ramen noodle, passing the soda and popcorn along whenever another major motion picture studio churns out inferior, formulaic nods to decades past.

But why then, are we so fervently embarrassed to admit that we love living in the past? Is it simply because everything looks so much better in hindsight? We loved Bernie Sanders after he lost the Democratic primary, we lamented the waning moments of our high school days (even though they were ostensibly turbulent and by all accounts terrible), and we still can't seem to let go of the notion that the past is still somehow at our disposal. Like a jilted friend or ex-lover we left for dead, nostalgia is in many ways a second chance at life itself — a second chance to see what all those self-inflicted miscalculations might've produced if they were repurposed for a new reality, sustained by an insatiable need to self-correct our very worst instincts. Yet nostalgia also has a funny way of coming up short, much like running into an ex lover or friend — a person you thought you missed dearly, only to be reminded that you probably made the right decision to ruin their life (and yours) all those years ago. Movies and television shows, in essence, are a lot like these encounters, and even if we know they're horrible for us on the surface, the idea of resurrecting the past in exchange for a moment of fleeting elation can, well, feel like one hell of a drug. 

Perhaps no one else in cinematic history knows drugs better than our old pals, Renton, Sick Boy, Begbie, and Spud, four wondrously-inspired characters brought to life by the great Danny Boyle 20 years ago — instructing American and European audiences alike how to manage the ups, downs, and endless tides of consumerism, while navigating through the pitfalls of post-punk industrialization and romanticism. After a torturously brutal reunion between Simon and Mark, Sick Boy turns to his ex-best friend, Renton, and reminds him that the two still share the same blood, referring to the innumerable needles shared during their trailblazing heroin days — a not-so-subtle reminder that "Trainspotting" still runs in our veins (and consciousness). Yet while the sequel tries to capture the ennui of Scotland's forgotten middle class, it also stubbornly resorts to "Layer Cake" caper yarns; at times fun and emotionally exhausting, Boyle's second chapter attempts to deliver a masterful Guy Ritchie spectacle while failing to capitalize on the dubious friendship between Renton and Sick Boy that makes the film stand out from most other sequels. It isn't until the film's introduction of Veronika, Simon's magician's assistant, that things really begin to take shape. By the time she utters the overused aphorism, "You live in the past. Where I come from, the past is what you forget," she's telling us that she too is in on the nostalgia. She not only proves to be a welcome distraction for the male moviegoers, she's the driving force behind Mark's inability to leave Scotland, the only pure piece of the puzzle that isn't married (or is it marred?) by the former tale's narrative infrastructure.

From an artistic standpoint, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the ways in which Boyle vigorously employs complex color schemes and rich, rhythmic chroma palettes. The sequence where Begbie and Renton blindly reunite in a toilet stall proves to be a particularly engaging gag, not just for its comedic effects, but for its gorgeously lit, cascading blue hues — adding maximum overdrive to each men's intensities (on one side, Begbie's unwavering blood lust, countered by Renton's fear and desire to make peace on the other). Their brief city street chase is also punctuated by a trademark familiarity coming straight from the director's chair, cuing us in to remind everyone watching (including the characters themselves) that they've done this all before. It's a nod to callbacks from the original film, as the producers behind "T2" literally replay pivotal scenes from "T1." Life, after all, can throw us the exact same curveballs, but what we choose to do with them is entirely up to us. We can either hit replay, as Mark does during his updated "choose Life" speech, we can hit pause, as Sick Boy attempts to do with his devious new money making schemes, or hit rewind and try to do all of it over again (which even Begbie realizes is downright impossible when he's thrown back in jail). All four characters realize they'll all have to hit play if they want to see where life takes them — and while it may not quite add up to the sum of its predecessor, it's still a last great hit of the good stuff.

"T2: TRAINSPOTTING 2" Rated R. Running time: 1 hour 57 minutes.