I was recommended this film by a friend, and after going through it and reviewing each particular scene...I'm not so sure that the actors or directors have done their research properly. This is a pretty poor depiction of heroin addiction and withdrawal.
Right when he uses in the first scene, he appears to have the symptoms of using meth. He's anxious, he's looking around nervously, etc. Not once did he fall out of consciousness or nod off. These are the symptoms of methamphetamine usage. During another scene, his bedside companion uses a substance on a vein in her inner thigh and immediately starts going into an orgasm. Also, a symptom of a methamphetamine induced "meth"-gasm.
During the scenes that he's using, he consistently goes into sweats and even one time at a party enters some kind of psychosis where he's hallucinating. Sweats occur during the withdrawal stage of addiction and hallucination does not ever occur unless mixed with another upper of some kind. Is he really using heroin? Until he starts using crack cocaine which can actually induce these symptoms that are depicted, each frame of mind that is displayed is the polar opposite of opiate-abuse.
Heroin induces involuntary dreaming, even happening mid-conversation where a user will "nod-off" in the middle of it. The case of _not_ having opiates in your bloodstream will actually give you flu-like symptoms. Instead, this film depicts the flu-like symptoms occurring during the time of the main character's usage of the substance which is terribly inaccurate.
Movies that depict opiate addiction and withdrawal accurately would be something such as BlackBird, Jesus' Son, or The Panic in Needle Park. This film unfortunately falls incredibly short of these other films in terms of accuracy. Other than these inaccuracies, the film is a fairly generic story of an addict losing control of his life. I probably wouldn't recommend this film to anybody.
Right when he uses in the first scene, he appears to have the symptoms of using meth. He's anxious, he's looking around nervously, etc. Not once did he fall out of consciousness or nod off. These are the symptoms of methamphetamine usage. During another scene, his bedside companion uses a substance on a vein in her inner thigh and immediately starts going into an orgasm. Also, a symptom of a methamphetamine induced "meth"-gasm.
During the scenes that he's using, he consistently goes into sweats and even one time at a party enters some kind of psychosis where he's hallucinating. Sweats occur during the withdrawal stage of addiction and hallucination does not ever occur unless mixed with another upper of some kind. Is he really using heroin? Until he starts using crack cocaine which can actually induce these symptoms that are depicted, each frame of mind that is displayed is the polar opposite of opiate-abuse.
Heroin induces involuntary dreaming, even happening mid-conversation where a user will "nod-off" in the middle of it. The case of _not_ having opiates in your bloodstream will actually give you flu-like symptoms. Instead, this film depicts the flu-like symptoms occurring during the time of the main character's usage of the substance which is terribly inaccurate.
Movies that depict opiate addiction and withdrawal accurately would be something such as BlackBird, Jesus' Son, or The Panic in Needle Park. This film unfortunately falls incredibly short of these other films in terms of accuracy. Other than these inaccuracies, the film is a fairly generic story of an addict losing control of his life. I probably wouldn't recommend this film to anybody.