Master and Commander Vs. Trainspotting

Hold on to your britches everybody; Master and Commander is a better movie than Trainspotting. Let me explain. I hadn't watched Trainspotting since it first came out and I saw it in the theater. I was blown away. It was awesome. I have remembered it as such ever since. I saw Mater and Commander by myself in a shitty theater in Miyazaki. The opening scene was punctuated by an earthquake. In the intervening years I have read Trainspotting twice and begun reading the Master and Commander series. The novel Trainspotting is easily one of the finest ever written. It is about people who have hit bottom. It is sad and heartbreaking. Watching the movie again recently it struck me as a shallow goof with a good soundtrack and decent acting. Nothing special. A little bothersome. I found myself wondering about the things they changed more than I normally do in an adaptation. I watched Master and Commander again yesterday. It is an amalgamation of several of the novels, yet I found it not bothering me in the least. It is such a well made, beautifully directed movie that I found myself not even thinking about the huge differences between the novels and the movie. The spirit seemed the same. Maybe being 30 and actually living on the bottom makes the adventuresness of Trainspotting seems absurd. Maybe the novel is just THAT much better. I don't know.