Nostalgia for Trainspotting is at a recordhigh this week with the release of recent visitor Danny Boyle's long-awaited and debated follow-up T2: Trainspotting.
Although the original film contains plenty of iconic moments, none has lingered more vividly in all of our minds as the bit where Renton (Ewan McGregor) climbsinto a particularly filthy porcelain throne - all too accurately keyed on screen as 'The Worst Toilet In Scotland' - in order to retrieve a mistakenly deposited suppository.
Although Boyle portrays Renton's metaphorical time 'inside' the loo as a occurring within a relatively clean-looking pool of water, the suggestion of what is happening is more than enough to make the scene grossly traumatic. As is the toilet's rim, and surrounding cubicle.
To celebrate this disgusting milestone in cinema, I will cite here five other iconically icky, must-turn-away, squirm-inducing moments from contemporary cinema.
The Guests Eat First: Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984)
When Indy (Harrison Ford), Willie (Kate Capshaw) and Short Round (Ke Huy Quan) sit down to dinner at the palace of the Maharajah, they are served up eyeball soup, monkey brains and a dish comprised of a massive snake that has other snakes inside it that ooze out when you cut the big snake open. Impossible to imagine in a modern day blockbuster adventure film, this queasy scene informs Temple's uneasy (racism, gore) legacy. And it put me off eyeball soup for life.
Liotta for Dinner: Hannibal (2001)
Brains are back on the menu in this grisly film full of grisly moments. The memorable climax depicted Ray Liotta's FBI agent, drugged up and missing the top of his head like a soft boiled egg, being served his own grey matter, cooked at the table teppanyaki style by his host, Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins). Although an undeniably effective set-piece, the recent Hannibal TV series (2013-15) did this sort of thing with much more class.
The Whole Darn Thing: Antichrist (2009)
The poster for Anti Christ. Photo/Supplied
You could pick a moment from almost any film by modern cinema's premier provocateur Lars von Trier (The Idiots, Nymphomaniac: Vol I, Nymphomaniac: Vol II) to go on this list, but the indescribable wince-induction comes thickest and fastest in Antichrist, perhaps his most purely antagonistic statement as a filmmaker.
Cuticular Trauma: Black Swan (2010)
The most hand-wringingly (literally) icky scene in this enjoyably disturbing psychological horror sees Natalie Portman's troubled ballerina pick away at her cuticles a bit too obsessively, suddenly stripping the skin off the top of her finger. My own fingers are trembling at the memory. Which isn't good for typing.
This recent horror hit soaked up every ridiculous thought anyone ever entertained about that other thing turkey basters are supposedly used for, inserted those thoughts into its grim finalé, then squeezed. It made for a very memorable climax, especially in how the full baster factors into the bad guy's comeuppance. So to speak.
