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List Price: $29.99 | | Label: Zeitgeist Films
Salesrank: 16613
Released: August 21, 2001 |
| Our Price: $17.17 |
| Used Price: $17.65 |
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MPAA Rating: Unrated
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
THE ACID HOUSE is a surreal triptych adapted by TRAINSPOTTING author Irvine Welsh from his own collection of short stories. Combining a vicious sense of humor with hard-talking drama, THE ACID HOUSE plunges the viewer into increasingly bizarre situations: hapless Boab Coyle has a chance encounter with a vengeful God; soft-centered Johnny is forced to contend with a psychotic neighbor and a wayward wife; and "Top Boy" Coco Bryce takes an acid trip that literally takes him back to the womb. Starring Ewen Bremner (Julien Donkey-Boy, BLACK HAWK DOWN), Kevin McKidd (TRAINSPOTTING) and Stephen McCole (RUSHMORE) THE ACID HOUSE reaches into the hearts and minds of the "chemical generation" and casts a dark and unholy light into the hidden corners of the human psyche.
The Acid House Reviews:
Instant Review: Great, Brilliant, Oh God make it stop. 
2007-01-21 - A collection of three films strung together with wildly different results.
The first film (The Granton Star Cause 8/10) is a pleasant surprise and high comedy. It is a take on Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis mixed with God, elderly S and M, and a football team. Outrageous and funny it is great black comedy involving a bloke named Boab who is having a very bad day indeed. And as God lovingly points out it is his own lazy incompetence that is basically responsible for his troubles.
The second film (The Soft Touch 10/10) is a top-notch drama that, for me at least, hit close to home. Kevin McKidd portrays a get along cuckolded husband with perfection while Gary McCormick, as Larry is stunning as the upstairs neighbor. American audiences are not used to seeing their protagonists pushed this far without pushing back but to this ear it rang realistic and very sadly true. The third film
(The Acid House 2/10) is a very overlong train wreck that may have worked on paper but fails miserably in film. It includes such Trainspotting regulars as that horrible mechanical baby (Like a demented Chucky) and brainless Coco who amuses for about five minutes before becoming tiresome. Add horrendous dialog, endless poop jokes and an acid trip left over from a Peter Fonda film and you have one great mess. As a five-minute bit it could have worked but time seems to stand still while it drags its bloated carcass on the screen.
God (who appears in all 3 segments wonderfully played by Maurice Roeves) may seem vengeful in the first film and carelessly sadistic in the second, but this viewer was praying to him during the third segment to make the pain go away.
Amusing but definetly offbeat. 
2005-09-09 - I heard about this movie a few years ago from a friend. What mainly interested me was that it was based on a novel by Irvine Welsh who also wrote Trainspotting. I loved the movie Trainspotting and so i decided to watch this, hoping it would be similar. It's really not. The film has its moments, but the camera work and the editing make parts of it very choppy. The story is not one story, but three and there is only a loose connection between them. It doesn't have near the drug content (or the drug related humor) that Trainspotting did. If you're a fan of Welsh's books then this may be worth watching, but if you're looking for another humorous take on drug addiction in Scotland, this is not Trainspotting 2.
better left in print 
2005-03-23 - This film was a very bizarre characterization of the Irvine Welsh collection of stories of the same name. While Trainspotting was a spot-on adaptation of a similar kind of book (random stories and characters) and excellent on-screen, The Acid House is better left for the printed page, although the unusual Ewen Bremner (Trainspotting's unforgettable "Spud") is a stand-out here.
Spellbound 
2004-11-29 - Well, It just so happened that i only "stumbled" upon this film.
It was on Foxtel recently and i flicked over, and it was already about halfway thru, but once i watched only even a minute of it, i could not bring myself to turn it off or change channels.
I have seen Trainspotting and that is not really my kind of film, and this film certainly isn't my kind either, but I can appreciate other people would like it.
I am quite converservative but like to think I have an open mind about most things, but maybe I don't. One of the lines in this film (only being able to realise what it was saying, due to the subtitles) that i found absolutely appalling was "lick ya mother's pi** flaps, ya c**t". I just couldn't not believe it. I was in shock and disbelief.
This film, as did Trainspotting, certainly showed me how some people in the world really live, and their unfortunate circumstances, and as much as I disliked it, i could not seem to look away or change channels. It saddens me to think that there are really situations like that and people living in an everyday hell. Makes me realise how lucky I am.
Rough around the edges...
2004-10-06 - As I review more and more films they are slowly becoming more and more difficult to review. Why? There are just some films out there that are this solid mix of great and average that it is difficult to give a definitive answer. Did I like it or didn't I? The lines are getting more and more fuzzy as the films continue to pour on. The only ones that I do not have trouble with are the uncreative lacklusters that Hollywood is notorious for releasing. Thankfully, that is not the case with The Acid House. Considered by some to be Trainspotting 2, I think that in actuality it is below Trainspotting. While Trainspotting had a definite plot and characters, this one is simply random stories that have come together in the end. There is no doubt in my mind that Irvine Welch's stories are superb. The styles in which these are portrayed and carried out are very imaginative and realistic (in a surreal sort of way) which really kept my attention. What they do lack is structure. That is why I have added this collection of stories to my list of books that I would like to own, but not the film. I cannot read the other stories that Irvine Welch has imagined for his home country, sadly, I am not interested in seeing anymore short stories theatrically released.
Don't get me wrong. This was my type of film. It was graphic, yet poignant, subtle yet powerful, and very brilliantly written with some interesting messages about life, it was just that I think it was too much for the director to handle. This was director Paul McGuigan's first film, and you could tell that he was just a little rough around the edges. He has transformed into a brilliant director since this film, but it just seems like this first film was pushed and again, rough around the edges. For example, the child in the final story eerily resembled Chucky from the Child's Play films. This cheap way of creating this character thoroughly distracted me from the story, but McGuigan was able to redeem himself with the final scene of this film when CoCo comes back to his body. This was the type of "give and take" that you had to accept with this film. While there were some horrible scenes, there were equally amazing scenes. I almost felt that I was watching a rough-cut of a Guy Ritchie film. There were just scenes that stood out that seemed like they were his classic moments.
I enjoyed the way these stories all came together. I loved the second story the most because it was so brilliantly depressing that you just couldn't help but find a piece of you somewhere in there. The first story was decent, but a bit too grotesque for my liking, while the third was surreally comical. I loved the subtitles (that were random throughout my version of the film) that allowed me to fully understand what these characters were saying. It was a good film. Not quite the potential that Trainspotting had, but still a decent film. I cannot wait to read the book and see what I missed from watching this first.
Overall, fun to watch the first time, but a continuous viewing will not be necessary.
Grade: *** out of *****
