A Clockwork Orange

 

        

        Well, this film isn't in the category of horror or scariness for the month of October, though in the rare sense of the definition of Horror I would claim this in the psychological horror, we face in a future where free will and crime wave have become a shroud of existence. Granted this was one of the many Stanley Kubrick movies I've never seen, and I need to prove even to myself that being a fan of cinema, I must step out of my comfort zone and of all movies I knew I needed to see in Kubrick's filmography, it was most certainly A Clockwork Orange. Though granted my brother made the choice for me to watch either Dr. Strangelove or A Clockwork Orange but I trusted my gut and my gut was telling me to pull the bandage off and watch A Clockwork Orange in the month of October.

        In an England of the future, Alex (Malcolm McDowell) and his "Droogs" spend their nights getting high at the Korova milk bar before embarking on "a little of the ultra-violence," while jaunty warbling "Singin' in the Rain." After he's jailed for bludgeoning of a latest victim of his, Alex submits himself to behavior modification technique to earn his freedom; he's conditioned to abhor violence. Returning to the world defenseless, Alex becomes the victim of his prior victims.

        A Clockwork Orange is one of those Stanley Kubrick films that I remember watching a AMC special called 30 scarier movie moments, basically ranking the top 30 scariest moments though they did the same concept years back with 100 scariest movie moments, bottom line they showed me one scene where I was disturbed and never imagine I would watch this movie ever and yet now that one whole scene where Alex and his goons are gang raping a writers wife and forcing him to watch, it just still doesn't stop the edge of disturbance among the viewer's and preparing to watch the movie now I'm I was just psychologically scarred that I personally felt I was having a panic attack and granted you don't see the gang raping scene because they cut quickly but the pacing of the scene and McDowell singing the song "Singin in the Rain" is just so cruel and disturbed it's almost a homage to Alan Moore's Batman: The Killing Joke, where the Joker is forcing Commissioner Gordon see pictures of Barbara Gordon shot in the spine as well as naked, just another image that leaves a disturbing quality to it. Even after watching this movie almost two weeks ago I had to try to figure out what I watched, I felt disturbed as well as traumatized in what I'm seeing and yet I consider this film one of the greatest artistic films of the 21st Century and even though this is the most disturbing movies I've ever seen close to Apocalypse Now, yes this is one of the greatest films I've ever seen, because they have a lot of major themes that included violence, morality, psychology and more importantly society as well. And the scariest thing about this film is that this is almost five steps into the front door of today's society, I mean sure we're not even close to what the film is showing us but if you take a look at major cities around the world or even your front window, we're getting a little bit to closing in on what A Clockwork Orange is presenting us as a whole, and even I wouldn't want to live in that dystopian world hell I'll take my kids and live out in the woods like Ron Swanson. One of the many interesting aspects you can see in Kubrick's vision is nobody is good, like Alex wonderfully portrayed by Malcolm McDowell, is this pure evil teenager that does unspeakable acts of violence and gets arrested of course but tries to find a loophole in the jailing system by subscribing to a technique of making a horrible person good. Now I'm not going into much detail as to how they do this procedure because I still want you all as an audience member to watch this great movie, but they do weeks and weeks of using the character Alex see countless imagery of violence with classical music in the background, now all of that is disturbing as well, but it also brings the interesting aspect of taking away free will, where the government that is supposed to be protecting us is supporting this idea of taking away violent criminals free will to do more acts of crime and make them safe citizens so, that they can walk on the streets we as society walk on, which again that's a terrifying aspect of our own government just doing this inhuman acts on criminals when they could just simply use the death penalty or live out the rest of their days in a cell, but again this is showing proof of why Kubrick is a great filmmaker. And through the course of the movie even into the third act we see the character of Alex being released from prison after being tortured from doing unforgivable acts of violence, he gets set free and coming back into society but even he is being brutally beaten and mocked from his parents and friends as well as being beaten by his own victims and this brings the most interesting aspect to Alex and this is coming from the Bible "You reap what you sow", which explains your action has consequences. And even when you watch this movie and I urge you to watch this movie without your kids’ sneaking downstairs and seeing you watching this movie and for good reasons, IT'S NOT SUITABLE FOR CHILDREN. But this brings a lot of interesting aspects of morality, violence as well as society and more importantly juvenile delinquency that gets you to change your own aspects as well as what you believe should happen in the world you live in. I'm pretty sure I covered everything about the film, other than this was for certain one of the second best in the Stanley Kubrick films I've seen so far, Full Metal Jacket still reigns supreme in my book but the thing about what makes this film amazing other then what I just described, is after finishing 2001: A Space Odyssey, upon which he went over budget through the course of making the film around 1968 and 1969, the producers of Warner Brothers simply told Kubrick about making a low budget film because he wanted to make a film about Napoleon Bonaparte furthermore producers couldn't necessarily finance is Napoleon movie so, he had to prove that he can make a low budget movie and A Clockwork Orange became his next project and the way he was able to portray a dystopian England is just beautifully created a side from the many phallic statues in the movie but the lighting though the course of the movie is so, great that you can't take your eyes off of the scenes you see. I saw this movie almost two weeks ago and I still can't get the imagery of the movie out of my mind and for sure this movie scares me, psychologically and deeply disturbed after watching the film. And yet this film gets you to think as well as change your aspects of life moreover I felt like I needed to change aspects of my own life. Yes, this movie is disturbing and well leaves you traumatized upon what you just seen, and yet I would highly recommend everyone to see this movie to be understood on what the film represents. Now having watched this film, would I watch this film many times maybe again, for inspiration soon but a bunch of times? Well, I'll give you a simple answer to that, NO! For many good reasons I need a good fifteen years maybe twenty years to get back into this f**ked up movie, and I remember hearing this guy talking about watching A Clockwork Orange fifteen times and still being disturbed and I'm saying to myself "what nut job watches this movie fifteen times?" Look the bottom line is, this film is nowhere on the streaming service and for good reasons but I'll promise you this for all movie fans and people who've never seen any of Stanley Kubrick films, this film is for certain worth the watch, but I would highly recommend not watching this when your kids around more like watching this film when your kids are fast asleep and making sure there not coming downstairs, that way you can hear them and turn the film off and get back to your kids, moreover that's probably the best way to watch this film if you have kids or not.