#90: A Clockwork Orange

A Clockwork Orange (Kubrick, 1971)

The big challenge with watching the movies of books I've already read is that it's hard not to compare the movie to the book. Any book of reasonable length can't be fit into feature film length without changing the plot a little. So every time I have to suppress the following reaction: "But…that part was important! Now you see the character completely different!" Actually, in the case of A Clockwork Orange, the last chapter was cut out of the original print by the editors. In the last chapter, Alex runs into Pete, who is married with a child and has moved beyond being a thug. Then he realizes he's bored being a 'droog' and quits his new gang. Which drives home the point, youth ends and people grow up. The major change between the book and the movie is that Kubrick decides not to make that point, and instead focuses on the politics of punishment and the inherent hypocrisy of intellectualism on the subject.

A Clockwork Orange is stylized like a Kubrick film. The settings are filled with post modern decor, matching the post-modern attitudes of the characters. Alex is a thug running around committing assault, rape, robbery, and then unintentionally a murder. But he lives in a society that doesn't see him as a person who made a choice. It diagnoses him as a disease to be cured. To their post-modern mindset, taking away Alex's ability to choose between good and evil is equal to him becoming a good person. But, none of them are thinking for themselves. They're hopping on intellectual bandwagons and believing whatever is popular to believe at the time. The governor endorses Alex's radical treatment while it's popular, then when it becomes unpopular, denounces it, in both cases using him as a tool to further his popularity. His parents denounce him when he's an embarassment, then accept him when he's a nationally renouned victim of persecution. Nobody in the film is honest to himself except Alex. Kubrick takes the plot and characters of A Clockwork Orange and bends them to serve his intellectual vendetta against the media and Hollywood mind control, and it works. (Although, I get the feeling the excess nudity was thrown in purely for shock value's sake.)

Rating: **** / 5

38/101

Others:

Umberto D: **** / 5

A film that clearly and directly influenced the recent indie film Wendy and Lucy, Umberto D takes place in postwar Italy, and shows a very realistic view of poverty. Umberto is a pensioner who is being evicted from his dirty apartment because he can't pay his rent. He tries to find ways to get money without having to sacrifice his pride. The writing is emotionally real, and the frustration universal to humanity.