Tuesday, August 16, 2005
A Clockwork Orange
A Clockwork Orange: 1971, Stanley Kubrick.
Based on the novel of the same name by Anthony Burgess.
These are my own comments about the movie. For plot, expert comments etc, please go to
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Clockwork_Orange
http://www.filmsite.org/cloc.html or
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0066921/
Well, to be frank, this was my third attempt to watch the movie. On the previous two occasions, I gave up of the movie inside the first thirty minutes into it. THis time I was more determinant to complete the move. So I called up vimal also to give me a company. As far as the movie is concerned, Kubrik has done a great job, to bring out the movie in the present state. A few striking afterthoughts from the movie.
1.The dialogues of the drunken old man, saying that the society is not for them, reflects to the attitude of the popular punk culture towards old people.
2. After having undergone the aversion therapy, when Alex was put into a demonstration to show his abomoniation towards violence,he is shown to lick the boot in order to get away from pain. This shows his blind, mechanical detestation towards the attack than anything else. It hardly reflects his actual wish, as rightly pointed out by the priest. A very valid concept here is,it is not worth living in the world, where we are forced to take decisions out of dread than anything else. Our free thoughts should not be clogged by the fright of the consequences, then human being cease to exist.
3. When Alex comes out, into the real world, where people are waylaying to pounce at him for revenge and political vendatta poor unsuspectable, phobic Alex is left with nothing but to get himself into precarious situations. This, I feel is a mockery to the real world society, and their stubbornness towards accepting a change.
The movie, I should say, after all, is worth watching. But I have a strong feeling that if he had to convey the above message to the masses, this was not the exact way of going about it. He should have restrained from showing so much violence and rape in the beginning, just to show the mental state of Alex. This shows, that Kubrick, although an exceptional movie maker, does not stand for the society or masses, rather, he makes movies for a particular set of audiences, who will always remain as his die hard fans. This is a selfish "money minded" motive, which makes me to think that after all, we are materialistic.....
