Fierce, disturbing, thought-provoking satire.

Rating: 10/10 (1 June 2007)

Stanley Kubrick takes an allegedly unfilmable novel by Anthony Burgess and transforms it into one of the great masterpieces of cinema. What, exactly, is A Clockwork Orange? A sci-fi social study? A fiercely thought-provoking and disturbing black comedy? A prescient warning of where society is headed? A criticism of how the law deals with crime and criminals? The list could go on and on, for the film could indeed be described as many things. But whichever way one chooses to approach the film, one thing is certain: it is without doubt one of the most uncompromisingly challenging examinations of the many faces of violence ever made. Where lies the attraction of violence, what are the consequences of violence, is there a solution to violence? It would be easy to expect a glib and sentimental answer to such questions, perhaps some comfortable conclusion that even the most evil of individuals is good at heart. But A Clockwork Orange avoids sentimentality and glibness and comfortable conclusions. This is a chilling film which points out that a solution to one evil is very often the evolution of another.
In a dystopian society of the very near future, youths calling themselves Droogs gets their kicks out of sadistic crime. One gang led by the clever but thoroughly nasty Alex (Malcolm McDowell) entertain themselves by assaulting an old tramp, breaking into a home and beating the man of the house before raping his wife, and driving like hooligans around country lanes, forcing other drivers off the road. One evening Alex forces his way into the house of a single woman and attacks her with a gigantic phallic ornament, eventually killing her by smashing the pot penis over her head. But Alex is actually captured for this particular offence and sentenced to 14 years in a rehabilitation institution. Here, Alex learns to survive by faking sincerity and repentance. However, he learns of a radical new treatment for violent criminals, a controversial method of therapy in which the subject is put through a rigorous series of experiments that ultimately suppress their desire to act criminally. Sensing a chance of early release, Alex facetiously volunteers to undergo the treatment. But when the therapy is over, he finds that he has lost more than his violent tendencies  even his basic human thought processes, his ability to make moral choices, have been taken away too.
McDowell gives a career-best performance as the sadistic narrator, terrifying in the film's horrific first half and oddly pitiable in the more philosophical second. His character is the fulcrum upon which the whole film depends  if his character doesn't work, then neither does the movie. Happily the actor passes with flying colours. Kubrick shoots each scene with characteristic meticulousness, generating horror when he wants horror, comedy when he wants comedy, and thought when he wants thought. The film's many images and philosophies resonate long afterwards, mainly due to the way Kubrick works them into our mind. A Clockwork Orange has a reputation for extreme violence (having been withdrawn by Kubrick himself for over twenty five years), but it is a more implied kind of violence rather than the visceral blood-spattering common to recent films. Much of what makes this film so disturbing takes place off screen, often in the viewer's own mind. It is a film to challenge our way of thinking, and as such a wonderfully provocative and worthwhile piece of cinema.