Closing out this year's 78th edition of the Edinburgh International Film Festival, Irvine Welsh: Reality Is Not Enough is the latest documentary to follow Scottish writer and Edinburgh local hero, Irvine Welsh.
Far from the first time that Welsh has been the subject of a documentary, Reality Is Not Enough may well be the definitive documentary about the novelist. FILMHOUNDS caught up with the writer of Trainspotting, as well as the director of the documentary, Paul Sng, to find out more about their experiences filming the documentary, as well as Irvine's work as a whole.
So, Paul, in the past, your work has often followed subjects of a punk sensibility. Whether it be musicians actively involved with punk like Poly Styrene or Sleaford Mods, they've all had a punk mentality. Do you see Irvine in the same way? What was it about Irvine that made him the perfect subject for a documentary?
Paul Sng: That's a really good point, and I hadn't thought about that, but you're right. I mean, Sleaford Mods are punky. Obviously, Poly and Tish, in her way, was not into punk, you know, she was into Jazz and Opera, but she had a do-it-yourself attitude which I think is at the heart of punk. Irvine, you know, was a punk, and we were chatting yesterday about how acid house, which inspired Irvine and his writing, was similar to punk in its attitude. I suppose all of the films in some way are about outsiders. As someone who feels like an outsider, and I always have, I suppose that's what interests me. Because you can be successful and still be an outsider. I think you [Irvine] probably are veering into… well, you're already an alternative national treasure, but now you might be on the verge of being like, not an establishment national treasure, but a national treasure.
Irvine Welsh: Right, fair play.
I think I would consider you a national treasure.
IW: Well, some people say I should be buried.
Pretty extreme. But growing up, myself and all my friends were very aware of your work. So, I think we always looked up to you and the things you wrote about and the things you stood for, so I think national treasure would be fair.
The main centrepiece of the film is the DMT trip that Irvine takes and the journey that it takes him on. I don't know what your perspective was before the film, Paul, but has it made you see drugs more as a therapeutic tool, or did you learn anything from it yourself?
PS: I've never done DMT, and I wanted to do it. When we came to do it, Irvine said to me, “Are you gonna do it?” and I was like, “No, I'm working” [laughs]. I was standing there filming him, and I was like, “I really wish I were doing this.”
IW: The amazing thing about it, for something that's so powerful, is that there's no hangover at all. There's no comedown, no hangover. Again, it's showing us something different, operating with this particular drug.
PS: Not because of making the film, but just in this time period, I gave up drinking. I suppose my attitude to drugs and to drinking… they seem at the moment to be in the past. I have no regrets over taking drugs and drinking, but they are tools that you can use, and I think sometimes you can, from my own personal experience, get carried away with certain things. I think DMT, for me, if I were to be offered the opportunity to take it, I definitely would love to, because it's something I've never done before. I don't necessarily want to take it with Chad [laughs], but how you've spoken about it is really appealing.
Speaking of Chad, in the film, Irvine, when you're talking to him, you say that things feel a bit “culty.” Do you still feel that way?
IW: Yeah, I mean, I don't like anybody who, you know, if you think of god as being cosmic energy that we're all part of, I don't like anybody that puts themselves between you and that experience, because they're invariably – whether they're kind of therapeutic helpers of the world or whether they're kind of fascist overlords sending you to your doom – they're invariably trying to control you in some. They can't have that inherent knowledge of this cosmos that you don't have because it's in everybody, basically.
Speaking of that cosmic energy, at the end of the film, you said you were never really a religious person, but you now see it as this cosmic energy that is going through everybody and is a part of everything. You speak a lot in the film about near-death experiences that you've had. After the trip, now that you see things differently, did you reflect on those experiences differently at all?
IW: Yeah. I think the one that I felt closest to death was in the pool in the Phoenix hotel because it felt like I had taken a lot of water into my lungs. I was down the bottom of the pool, and I was out, and I could feel myself rising above the water level into space: then suddenly I was hooked out. I just felt this zoom back into my body, and I was kind of held upside down, and all this water was coming out of me. The motion that I felt in the DMT trip, and the rising of the body, the rising of the spirit or the life force out of the body felt very similar to that. So it did evoke that particular experience.
Speaking of mortality and the legacy that you'll leave behind, in the film, you discuss how you were never for Scottish nationalism and how this came out through your writing of Renton. In recent years, however, you have rallied for Scottish independence. The famous “it's shite being Scottish” monologue from Trainspotting has always been used as somewhat of a pro-independence sentiment, but it sounds like it came from a nihilistic point of view about the way things were at the time. How do you feel about having your work used to support independence?
IW: I think it applies even more so now. I mean, you'd have to be some kind of really crazy person to say that the last ten years of unionism have worked out for us. I mean, it's not been particularly brilliant. It's gone to shit. The people who are in power should be held to account for that. I think that's kind of a conversation that, the further away that seems to be, the closer it seems to become as well, basically. It's embedded in our political DNA now. It's not going to go away.
A question for both of you. In the film, Irvine, there is a conversation between you and your agent where you say you don't think anyone can be taught to be a writer. I know both of you have been involved in arts education in the past. Irvine, I know you're a patron for Screen Education Edinburgh. Paul, I believe you've done some work with them before as well?
PS: I've been a tutor thanks to Graham Fitzpatrick, who was one of the first people I met in Edinburgh when I came up. I think you can teach tools, I think. You can teach people about structure and character, but the art of storytelling it's something that, in some ways, there are people who are just naturally good storytellers.
IW: Yeah, I think it's to do with motivation. It's an exercise of will, really.
So, along those lines, how important do you think it is to fund arts education? Not only to teach but to encourage and to motivate.
PS: I think, absolutely everywhere. Particularly places in Scotland that are not in the central belt. I think one of the most important things if you are an artist or a writer, or want to be one, is to be able to see yourself and see that you can do it. For me, when I was growing up, being British and Chinese and working class, and looking around as a youngster, I didn't see people that looked or sounded like me who were directors. I just thought directors were people who were in Hollywood, people like Steven Spielberg. So it didn't seem possible. It seemed like you've got to have money to do this. So I never pursued it. It wasn't until 10 years ago that I first picked up a camera and made a film, so it's really important to be able to visualise that you can do something and that starts as a young person in schools. The fact that you can have film, now, on the curriculum it legitimises it. If I'd have gone to my mum when I was fourteen and said “I want to be a filmmaker”, my mum's very supportive, but she would have said “that's not a subject, that's not something that you can make a living from.” I think, for parents, now that it's on the curriculum, it legitimises it as something that, of course, not everyone will go on and make a living from it, but I think it's important that it's seen as a valid profession to do just the way as being a doctor or being a fitness instructor is. It's something that can be vocational, that you can study, learn a bit about, and hopefully, you know, find employment from.
Irvine Welsh: Reality Is Not Enough screened at Edinburgh International Film Festival.
