Filth

The Book

Its not often when reading a novel, that you find yourself routing for a tapeworm!
Detective Sergeant Bruce Robertson is the most foul-mouthed, misogynistic, callous character I have ever come across in fiction. Filth is readable and entertaining, but I had to do it in small doses. I almost felt physical revulsion when picking up the book as I had to steel myself for descriptions of disease, sordid sex and constant swearing. Maybe it was because I was unwell at the time of reading it - not a bedside read.

The prose is very cleverly written, with some Scottish accent, varying points of view and gradual psychosis of the main narrator. The gradual slippage into the plural, as in the royal "we", signifies the narrator's breakdown and duality of viewpoints - but is it the tapeworm or is it a further split in Bruce's personality?




As mentioned, Bruce is carrying around a tapeworm in his gut, and you get to read the organism's internal monologue over that of its host. It is as ruthless as Bruce in wanting to survive, but its language and philosophical ponderings make it the character you empathise with the most. It is the worm that relates the tragic early childhood of Bruce and succeeds in making you feel pity for a character you previously loathed.
Irvine Welsh's book is a brilliant work of clever plotting and reader manipulation, but I was glad to finish it and move on.

 


Film website

 

The Film

There have been a couple of attempts to bring Irvine Welsh books to the screen following the success of Trainspotting, but they didn't embrace the crazy anarchic style so much as Filth. At last, we have a fitting companion to sit alongside that iconic Scottish film.

The film doesn't take as long as the book in showing that things are not all hunky dory inside the head of Bruce Robinson.

As well as his seeing his dead brother and other people as twisted masked animals, Bruce also drops out of consciousness and into Dr Rossi's consulting room, where a creepy Jim Broadbent with enlarged forehead takes the place of the inner monologue of the tapeworm.

Brilliant use of to camera is used by Shauna MacDonald (Carole) in soft focus monologue about her husband and James MacAvoy, (Bruce) in his knowing looks to camera as he is about to disgrace one of his mates. His last "Same Rules Apply" to camera stay in your mind long after leaving the cinema. MacAvoy dominates the film and his emotional range is amazing; at one point jumping from crying to bitter phone sex in a heartbeat.

Most of the vindictive cruelty is played out but balanced with a pity on a clearly unwell and deteriorating main character. I loved Jamie Bell's Ray Lennox - the clear embarrassment on his face at the suggestion of the party game "guess the photocopied genitals" was priceless.

Another highlight - where Trainspotting had Underworld's Born Slippy, Filth provides us with the bizarre but sing-a-long joy of David Soul lip-synching to his own Silver Lady after having picked up Carole as a hooker of the street.

So many memorable moments. I want to watch this again!

There is very little out there like this, so I won't recommend anything similar - just stick with Filth!