About being Scottish, and how that relates to being Greek, according to Eugenia.
About being Dutch.
We’re very tolerant.
Towards people who look, speak, and behave exactly like us. Or who have lots of money. If you don’t fit into one of those categories, you’re a terrorist.
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so true!
Comment by maarten ornstein — December 14, 2008 @ 9:25 am
Hehh, so I guess most people on this planet are Dutch :)
Comment by l3v1 — December 14, 2008 @ 12:22 pm
Eugenia is taking the Scottish quote way out of context. Renton is meant to be a ex-Heroin addict with little or no future prospects at that point in the film. Irvine Welsh is being ironic. Danny Boyle also completely screwed with the story and characters. The original book leaves you thinking something very different.
Comment by memsom — December 14, 2008 @ 2:53 pm
I’ve lived in Holland, too many Dutch people are anti-buitenlander which is niet zo gezellig, including definitely couldnt be a terrorist in a million years kind of buitenlanders, especially the German buitenlanders, which us other buitenlanders would say is splitting hairs somewhat, whats that line in your national anthem about a motherland, it escapes me and Intellectual bigotry is still bigotry, bigotry is anti-intellectual. You have a nice culture, and on the whole are nice people.
Comment by not_so_quick_punk — December 14, 2008 @ 10:35 pm
>Irvine Welsh is being ironic.
Nope, he’s just being controversial. He’s not ironic, or using a metaphor, at all. It’s just his angry side of him, seen through the eyes of an angry/sad guy.
Comment by Eugenia — December 15, 2008 @ 6:36 am
We’re very tolerant. Towards people who look, speak, and behave exactly like us. Or who have lots of money.
Let’s split that in parts.
The people that look exactly like us: the Vikings, the AngloSaxons, the forefathers of the Hollandish Arrogant Giants.
The people that speak exactly like us: of course, otherwise the Dutch will never be able to understand you, because they only speak their own dialect of Dutch.
The people that behave exactly like us: the Vikings, the AngloSaxons and no other people. The Germans and Flemish that look like them don’t speak exactly like them, so they are not tolerated. They are regarded as inferior.
Or those who have a lot of money: that is typically Hollandish. Always has been. Will always be so. Corrupt Hollandish.
Comment by capricornus — December 15, 2008 @ 5:26 pm
Are you joking? First of all, I never got the impression that Welsh was being ironic - he *is* pretty damn’d cynical about Scottish patriotism.
Secondly, other than Fight Club, I can’t think of a more faithful film translation of a novel (and I say this as a former Irvine Welsh obsess-ee, having read just about everything he’s ever published).
The only real differences I can remember is that Renton is a redhead in the novel, and Boyle didn’t include the part where Renton gets inebriated and hits on his teenage cousin at a wake.
Comment by Stephen B. — December 17, 2008 @ 10:07 pm
About being American…
We all love our country and think it’s the greatest country on earth but half of us think it’s going to hell in a hand basket and the other half think things are only going to get better. Everyone has experienced both views at different times depending on the political party in power and their political affiliations.
Comment by abraxas — December 18, 2008 @ 1:33 am
America is also just about the only nation where people manage to convince themselves that they live in the greatest country on earth - without ever having actually set foot in any other country.
Comment by Stephen B. — December 21, 2008 @ 6:09 pm