One of the most bizarre and unique films ever attempted

Rating: 8/10 (30 January 2006)

Of course it's not perfect...how could it be? Stanley Kubrick, the obsessive-compulsive auteur was the only choice (except for Ken Russell, who would have had a ball with it) to bring Anthony Burgess's brutally compelling novel to the screen, and he does a fine job. The opening shot, of a smirking, unblinking Alex, staring down the gradually retiring camera as he drinks spiked milk prior to going on a violent rampage of vagrant-beating, gang fights, joyriding, housebreaking and rape, makes sure the film grabs you from the start and doesn't let go. And what a journey it is! A CLOCKWORK ORANGE takes in everything, and I do mean everything, from high farce, black comedy, surrealism, British smut and schaedenfreude to some of the most disturbing, troubling and thought-provoking sequences ever committed to celluloid. It's a film that delights in pulling the carpet out from beneath the viewer, again and again and again. And it works on all kinds of levels, too - beneath the 'futuristic' veneer (which, for all I know, could have already looked dated in 1971) there's a virulent satire on the sheer, eyeball-coruscating ugliness of modern architecture, particularly the neo-brutalist school of characterless concrete blocks and swathes of hideous white cement that was cropping up all over Britain at the time. Then there are the 'minimalist' interiors, hideous costumes (especially on the female characters!), Godawful pieces of pop art trash...it's clear that Kubrick really HATED this stuff, and it must have been a conscious decision for him to dump the classically-minded misfit Alex (whose taste for Beethoven and the most sordid aspects of the Bible mark him out as one who abhors a shallow modernity, and rebels against it wherever possible) in the middle of a world that's so alienating and drab. A common complaint among British youths of the seventies, the nascent 'punks' in particular, was that "everything's crap" - and looking at the ghastly (and surprisingly, not TOO exaggerated) world of A CLOCKWORK ORANGE, you can understand where they were coming from! I could banter about this film all day, druggies, but this is my perspective - it's one of the most vicious pieces of social satire ever created, and the legacy of the horrible world little Alex was rebelling against is still with us, decades later. Viddy well, little brothers!