**** out of 5

Rating: Null/10 (8 November 2003)

I try to avoid talking about classic movies. They have already been analyzed to an extent where it almost becomes an impossibility to come up with anything fresh or interesting to say. But A Clockwork Orange is a film that is still making itself today.	Of course, not of the same effect today as it had on audiences in 1971. With it being placed next to such modern controversy as Natural Born Killers and American Psycho it is hard to appreciate just how original it was when it was made. Yet still it holds strong as the reigning king of controversy to this day, and with changes in society and science fiction on a whole, it is an exception to be made when coming time discuss its content.
At its best, A Clockwork Orange is an `out-there' type of cult masterpiece, staging over-the-top theatrical tactics to make its point, while at the same time breaking it down into mockery.	At its worst it is still a pretty good, if not an overrated classic of flawed proportion, whose reputation has been built, more so, on the controversy that surrounds it than on the technique of its filmmaking.
The first half of the film lives and breathes its character, Alex de Large. Alex is ` a young man whose principal interests are rape, ultra-violence and Beethoven.' An anti-hero whose mind is set more on anti than hero. A character study all to his own right. He and his `droogs' roam the streets of a futuristic society at night looking for old men to beat and women to rape for something to do.	But when one of the victim's dies and Alex is betrayed by his friends, he is sent to jail. In jail he hears of an experimental government program that is designed to get criminals out of jail and keep them out. Alex is the first test subject.	After being forced to watch videos of violent behaviour, Alex is released back to a society that doesn't want him, making him sick to all the ills that he used to be a part of, creating a doubtfulness towards the power of society and politics.	Some have argued that director Stanley Kubrick `made' A Clockwork Orange. But in the shape of it all, this film is more a vibrant distraction from the lively sarcasm of the much superior book of the same name, by the late Anthony Burgess.	What Kubrick is missing here is much of what made his adaptation of Steven King's The Shining so disappointing. Failing to implement key story traits, Kubrick directs his vision, but not the same vision of politically incorrect poetry that made the book such a pleasure.	The book was a first- person character study, existing within the paradoxes of an individual mind without the use of third person analogies. This is not a problem to the genius first half of the film. But after Alex is released back upon the world there is nothing but third party character present, making it unbelievable to distinguish Alex from just another background fixture. Changing from character study to storytelling, forgetting that the story lies in the character.	The most noteworthy of controversy attached to A Clockwork Orange was its label as `violent porn.' But in looking at such criticism with equal opportunity to criticize we can see that the term `violent porn' has spawned for the narrow influence of individuals who base philosophies on their first reactions.	`Porn' is an adjective, describing an outlet for gratuitous sexual stimulation. There is nothing that I can find even remotely pleasurable in the horrifying acts committed in this film, and anyone who argues differently has fetishes that run deeper than the content at hand.	As for `violent.' It is another adjective, but this time misinterpreted as a noun. Because the word, in this case, is not to be used as a noun we rarely witness the violence. It is a mere deterrent used to describe the atmosphere. On the other hand, the violence that is seen is viewed from a comedic standpoint. That's the gift of satire, you don't have to find it funny to be able to laugh.	If anything this is a positive film, teaching the Christian belief that it is the right of all individuals to have free will and choice. As stated by Blake Morrison in the book's introductions, `Alex must be able to choose to be good; he must be an orange, capable of growing and sweetness, not a wound-up clockwork toy.' Meaning that an orange may be bitter at first but it has the ability to grow on its own and ripen into something sweet. Unlike clockwork which only works on the basis of what it is programmed to do.
Malcolm McDowell doesn't only play Alex, he is Alex. McDowell goes so far for absolute broke in his take-no-prisoners performance, that it could have ruined the film and career of a lesser man. In a role that is so rowdy, McDowell never takes himself serious Always sporting a mean grin of pleasure and a jolly sort of stance, making him nothing short of unintentional evil. A scene in which Alex kicks a man who is down while reciting Singing in the Rain is of utmost classic and one of the best in this film.
A Clockwork Orange is not an easy film to watch or even all that inspiring of one either. It knows that just as many people hate it and don't understand it as those who love it. But those who do love it love it for the right reasons. Not because it is a well made film. It is nowhere near a definitive Kurbick masterpiece, but because `when a man does not have the ability to chose, he ceases to be a man.'