A Clockwork Orange (1971)

"Being the adventures of a young man ... who couldn't resist pretty girls ... or a bit of the old ultra-violence ... went to jail, was re-conditioned ... and came out a different young man ... or was he?"

Directed by Stanley Kubrick
Produced by Stanley Kubrick
Screenplay by Stanley Kubrick
Based on "A Clockwork Orange" by Anthony Burgess
Starring: Malcolm McDowell, Patrick Magee, Adrienne Corri, Miriam Karlin
Music by Walter Carlos
Cinematography: John Alcott
Edited by Bill Butler
Production companies: Polaris Productions, Hawk Films

Distributed by Warner Bros., Columbia-Warner Distributors (United Kingdom)
Release date: 13 January 1972 (United Kingdom)
Running time: 136 minutes
Country: United Kingdom
Budget: $2.2 million
Box office: $26.6 million (North America)

"A Clockwork Orange" is a sci-fi crime drama film adapted, produced, and directed by Stanley Kubrick, based on Anthony Burgess's 1962 novella "A Clockwork Orange". It tells the story of charismatic delinquent Alex DeLarge in a dystopian near-future Britain.

Cast

• Malcolm McDowell as Alex DeLarge
• Patrick Magee as Mr. Frank Alexander
• Michael Bates as Chief Guard Barnes
• Warren Clarke as Dim
• John Clive as Stage Actor
• Adrienne Corri as Mrs. Mary Alexander
• Carl Duering as Dr. Brodsky
• Paul Farrell as Tramp
• Clive Francis as Joe the Lodger
• Michael Gover as Prison Governor
• Miriam Karlin as Cat Lady
• James Marcus as Georgie
• Aubrey Morris as P. R. Deltoid
• Godfrey Quigley as Prison Chaplain
• Sheila Raynor as Mum
• Madge Ryan as Dr. Branom
• John Savident as Conspirator
• Anthony Sharp as Frederick
• Philip Stone as Dad
• Pauline Taylor as Dr. Taylor
• Margaret Tyzack as Conspirator Rubinstein
• Steven Berkoff as Detective Constable Tom
• Lindsay Campbell as Police Inspector
• Michael Tarn as Pete
• David Prowse as Julian
• Jan Adair, Vivienne Chandler and Prudence Dage as handmaidens
• Peter Burton as Junior Minister
• John J. Carney as Detective Sergeant
• Richard Connaught as Billyboy, Gang Leader
• Carol Drinkwater as Nurse Feeley
• Cheryl Grunwald as Rape Victim in Film
• Gillian Hills as Sonietta
• Virginia Wetherell as Stage Actress
• Katya Wyeth as Girl in Ascot Fantasy
• Lee Fox as Desk Sergeant
• Craig Hunter as Doctor
• Neil Wilson as Prison Check-in Officer
• Pat Roach as Milkbar Bouncer

"A Clockwork Orange" is one of the most successful Stanley Kubrick's pictures. It's has a great influence on the audience that made the film cult - not without purpose: the picture shows how immorality is reflected in the society in which he lives. During watching it I felt sick few times as the film tuned out really hard.

As for the cast, I wnat to mention Malcolm McDowell whose Alex DeLarge seems a true evil with beautiful and innocent eyes.

Advantages

• Stanley Kubrick

Disadvantages

• Too much violence
• Too much violence against women
• Too much personal violence

"Strangenesses"

• Why people want to do things like these?

Clue Moments

• The Ludovico technique
• Friends' betrayal

Violence is so widely distributed, even popular - that horrifies so much. Murders, robberies and rapes happen every day and there's no getting away from it - only if the society changes, something will replace. What scares more is that the government and law machinery are also prone to these actions. A usual job for people whose time to work. This way, almost anyone can help a person to be safe and sound except him- or herself. Sadly.

What is the Ludovico technique? According to Wikipedia, it involved forcing a patient to watch, through the use of specula to hold the eyes open, violent images for long periods, while under the effect of a nausea-, paralysis-, and fear-inducing drug. The aim of the therapy was to condition the patient to experience severe nausea when experiencing or even thinking about violence, thus creating an aversion to violent behaviour.

Soundtracks

1. Wendy Carlos - Title Music from A Clockwork Orange
2. Gioachino Rossini - The Thieving Magpie (Abridged)
3. Wendy Carlos - Theme From A Clockwork Orange (Beethoviana)
4. Ludwig van Beethoven - March From A Clockwork Orange (9th Symphony, Fourth Movement-Abridged)
5. Gioachino Rossini - William Tell Overture
6. Edward Elgar - March #1, Pomp & Circumstance
7. Edward Elgar - March #4, Pomp & Circumstance
8. Wendy Carlos - Timesteps (Excerpt)
9. Terry Tucker - Overture to the Sun
10. Erika Eigen - I Want to Marry A Lighthouse Keeper
11. Gioachino Rossini - William Tell Overture (Abridged)
12. Ludwig van Beethoven - Suicide Scherzo (9th Symphony, Second Movement-Abridged)
13. Ludwig van Beethoven - 9th Symphony, Fourth Movement (Abridged)
14. Gene Kelly - Singin' In The Rain
15. Wendy Carlos - Beethoviana

Quotations

* * *

Alex: It's funny how the colors of the real world only seem really real when you viddy them on the screen.

* * *

Alex: There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is Pete, Georgie, and Dim, and we sat in the Korova Milkbar trying to make up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening. The Korova milkbar sold milk-plus, milk plus vellocet or synthemesc or drencrom, which is what we were drinking. This would sharpen you up and make you ready for a bit of the old ultra-violence.

* * *

Alex: I was cured, all right!

* * *

Alex: No. No! NO! Stop it! Stop it, please! I beg you! This is sin! This is sin! This is sin! It's a sin, it's a sin, it's a sin!
Dr. Brodsky: Sin? What's all this about sin?
Alex: That! Using Ludwig van like that! He did no harm to anyone. Beethoven just wrote music!
Dr. Branom: Are you referring to the background score?
Alex: Yes.
Dr. Branom: You've heard Beethoven before?
Alex: Yes!
Dr. Brodsky: So, you're keen on music?
Alex: YES!
Dr. Brodsky: Can't be helped. Here's the punishment element perhaps.

* * *

Alex: Welly, welly, welly, welly, welly, welly, well. To what do I owe the extreme pleasure of this surprising visit?

* * *

Prison Chaplain: Goodness is something to be chosen. When a man cannot choose he ceases to be a man.

* * *

Conspirator: Do you still feel suicidal?
Alex: Well, put it this way, I feel very low in myself. I can't see much in the future, and I feel that any second something terrible is going to happen to me.

* * *

Alex: I woke up. The pain and sickness all over me like an animal. Then I realized what it was. The music coming up from the floor was our old friend, Ludwig Van, and the dreaded Ninth Symphony.

* * *

Alex: Initiative comes to thems that wait.

* * *

Prison Chaplain: Choice! The boy has not a real choice, has he? Self-interest, the fear of physical pain drove him to that grotesque act of self-abasement. The insincerity was clear to be seen. He ceases to be a wrongdoer. He ceases also to be a creature capable of moral choice.
Minister: Padre, there are subtleties! We are not concerned with motives, with the higher ethics. We are concerned only with cutting down crime and with relieving the ghastly congestion in our prisons. He will be your true Christian, ready to turn the other cheek, ready to be crucified rather than crucify, sick to the heart at the thought of killing a fly. Reclamation! Joy before the angels of God! The point is that it works.

* * *

Alex: It had been a wonderful evening and what I needed now to give it the perfect ending was a bit of the old Ludwig van.

* * *

Chief Guard Barnes: Violence makes violence.

* * *

Minister: But enough of words, actions speak louder than. Action now. Observe all.

* * *

Alex: Suddenly, I viddied what I had to do, and what I had wanted to do, and that was to do myself in; to snuff it, to blast off for ever out of this wicked, cruel world. One moment of pain perhaps and, then, sleep for ever, and ever and ever.

* * *

Minister: Punishment means nothing to them, you can see that. They enjoy their so-called punishment.
Alex: You're absolutely right, sir.
Chief Guard Barnes: Shut your bleeding hole!

* * *

You may see the trailer here.

Plot: 8/10

Entertainment: 8/10

Acting: 7/10

Originality: 9/10

Music and Sound: 7/10

8/10