Young Adam **** (2003, Ewan McGregor, Tilda Swinton, Peter Mullan, Emily Mortimer) – Classic Movie Review 477

In writer-director David Mackenzie’s 2003 film Young Adam, Ewan McGregor gives his best, most convincing performance in ages, back in his native Scottish accent and setting, and truly inhabiting his character as a young drifter called Joe.

He takes work on a Glasgow-Edinburgh canal barge with sad, older Les (Peter Mullan), but is soon having an affair with the man’s randy wife Ella (Tilda Swinton), right under his nose. Then they find the body of a young woman in the water…

This noirish thriller is dark, bleak, almost despairing, but utterly compelling with three marvellously judged performances to urge compellingly it along to its satisfying conclusion. Based on a novel by Alexander Trocchi, Mackenzie’s screenplay is as skilled and crafted as his direction. Emily Mortimer co-stars as Cathy, a former girlfriend of McGregor’s.

Gilles Nuttgens’s cinematography and David Byrne’s score also are vital to the film’s haunting effect.

For the record, McGregor gets his kit off. His full-frontal scenes were going to be cut from the US release but, after McGregor objected, the nude scenes were put back in. He decided not to take his family along for the shoot.

McGregor’s penis has appeared in films such as Young Adam, Trainspotting, The Pillow Book and I Love You Philip Morris. In January 2015 Colin Farrell joked: ‘I don’t think Ewan is as proud of his penis as most men who are as well hung would — or should — or could be.’

© Derek Winnert 2013 Classic Movie Review 477

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