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Unpopular Opinion: A Clockwork Orange really isn’t all that great

Unpopular OpinionsThere’s a scene early in Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange where Alex DeLarge (Malcolm McDowell) and his gang of “droogs” run into a rival gang midway through engaging in an evening of “ultra-violence”. Alex and the droogs stop what they’re doing (raping a group of women) and fight the rival gang. While the scene unfolded, I couldn’t help but think of a of a quote from the seminal Australia young-adult novel, Tomorrow When the War Began. It reads:

“People, shadows, good, bad, Heaven, Hell: all of these were names, labels, that was all. Humans had created these opposites: Nature recognised no opposites. Even life and death weren’t opposites in Nature: one was merely an extension of the other. All I could think of to do was trust to instinct. That was all I had really. Human laws, moral laws, religious laws, they seemed artificial and basic, almost childlike.”

I thought of this quote because at it’s core A Clockwork Orange is a film about how laws and labels affect our understanding of morality. It is natural then that Kubrick was the man to make the film (an adaption of Anthony Burgess’s novel of the same name). Kubrick specialises in creating films that explore and challenge the fundamental elements of human existence whether it be family, The Shining; sex, Eyes Wide Shut; or the existentialism of our existence, 2001: A Space Odyssey.

A Clockwork Orange shares a lot of similarities to those films I just mentioned. It has a lot to say with a lengthy runtime of 136 minutes, during which we track the (anti)hero’s journey of Alex, experiencing his failures, triumphs, and pains. It is imbued with Kubrick’s unique stylistic sensibilities that take fully real sets made up of mundane elements and elevate them with a unique blend of filmmaking language. It is considered to be a classic, like many of his other films.

 

However, there is one major separating difference between A Clockwork Orange and Kubrick’s other classic.

Namely: that A Clockwork Orange is not a good ©

Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange

© Warner Bros.

. It’s a bad film. Maybe even a terrible one.

That’s not to say that A Clockwork Orange is not an iconic film because it is certainly that. The films first image of Alex looking directly into the camera existed in my mind long before any concept of the film did. What is often forgotten however is what comes next. The camera slowly pulls out to reveal Alex and droogs sitting in a silent tableau in a room full of pornographic statues of women.

It’s telling, I think, that we remember the first half of that image but not the second, because A Clockwork Orange is about the second. Set in a dystopic and totalitarian version of England, A Clockwork Orange follows Alex as he commits a spree of crimes as a way to live his life to the fullest. This leads to his arrest and incarceration. While in prison the totalitarian government selects him for psychological reprogramming (re: torture) which will stop him from committing crime in the future.

Like every Stanley Kubrick film the behind the scenes stories become just as famous as the film itself, if not more famous. It was banned in England due to the controversial way Kubrick depicts its protagonist. Alex is treated like any other protagonist, good things and bad things happen to him throughout the film we’re expected to empathise with him, take his side in every plight. To Kubrick, Alex is just like many other heroes throughout fiction, he just wants to be his most authentic self.

Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange

© Warner Bros.

I take issue with this however because Alex’s most authentic self is a violent murder and rapist. The society Alex is in is just as bad. The police as brutal, torture is practically legal, the government is a totalitarian regime that can get away with anything. Alex is no better or worse than them, he’s just as bad in a different way. Kubrick doesn’t want to judge Alex, he’s saying if everyone else is bad, then you can be bad too as long as you’re your most authentic self while doing it.

This perhaps shouldn’t be surprising coming from Kubrick, this is the man after all famous for torturing his actors in the name of authenticity. Kubrick made actors do take after take of brutal rape and murder scenes until they were ‘good enough’. In the psychological torture scene Kubrick made Malcolm McDowell have his eyelids pried painfully open because it was the most authentic version of the image he wanted to create. Not the safest, the most authentic.

Marvin Gaye once said that “Great artists suffer for the people”. There is truth in that certainly. I do not however think great artists make other people suffer for their art, which is what Kubrick always did. In that way A Clockwork Orange ends up Kubrick attempting justifying his own filmmaking style. He doesn’t say anything critical of Alex because if he were to then he would also have to reflect on himself, and Kubrick was not willing to do that.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPRzm8ibDQ8&w=560&h=315]

“Labels are a human creation”, claims the quote I cited earlier. On this A Clockwork Orange and I agree. If that’s the case, then labels can be challenged. We label A Clockwork Orange a classic. I want to challenge that. If your art cannot be made without explicitly making others suffer, then don’t make it.

A Clockwork Orange should not be considered a classic. It’s just pretentious torture porn that fails to justify its own existence.

What do you make of Josh’s thoughts on A Clockwork Orange? Leave your thoughts in the comments box below. We’d love to hear from you.

15 Comments

  1. K at the Movies

    Interesting points. I’ve always taken away from A Clockwork Orange is that Alex is supposed to be hated by the audience as he’s a deplorable and heinous person, but the point is to present the moral quandary as to whether the government is justified in sedating or conditioning him through unethical means. I think “pretentious torture porn” might be a gross oversimplification to prove a point, it does rely heavily on shock value and sensationalism but there are certainly theme exploration and filmmaking techniques that make it an interesting watch. I would probably shy away from calling it a “classic” (Usually infers some sense of the best of the best) but I think it’s a prominent film that deserves to be discussed and challenged in this manner rather than forgotten.

    • Adam Brannon

      Hi there! Thanks so much for your comment. I think that’s why we all love film so much, it can be so subjective that one man’s trash is another man’s treasure! I myself really like the film, but I’ll be sure to pass on your comments to Josh! Thanks again, Adam.

  2. David

    You miss the point of the story if your first “hot take” is that the main character is a mysoginist. Also, not an unpopular opinion to dislike violent movies, join the club with all the rest of the pc babies. Maybe you’re just extremely dumb as fuck, did you consider that?

    • Adam Brannon

      Hi David, thanks for your comment. I absolutely do not tolerate abuse of my contributors from anybody on my site. The whole point of this series of articles is for my team to share their thoughts on a number of topics that would be classed as ‘Unpopular Opinions’, and the fact that you feel the need to berate anyone for doing so speaks more about your character than about Joshua’s for writing this article.

    • Mae

      “How dare they say that a movie which features 4 minute long rape scenes is pushing that for no reason!! it’s not like the director could have made their point without showing women being brutalized!! Not liking rape which for a long time in our society has been normalized means you’re a big baby who needs to watch children’s movies!!” No David, it just means you have something wrong in your head and want to watch women be attacked and feel weirdly threatened by the idea of that being wrong.

      Rape could have just as much been alluded to without normalizing a woman getting her clothes cut off while having a gag in front of a camera. David, just because you get off to woman being tortured, does not mean it needed to be in the film, and in fact, it took away from the film. Shock value could have been achieved without featuring it.

      If you look at history, it’s not that uncommon for violence against women and rape to be normalized. I mean public torture used to literally be an event people went to. So I don’t know why people defending it think is so amazing and ground breaking normalizing rape scenes on the screen. Violence for the sake of violence for entertainment is ridiculous, and not uncommon in movies. Clearly, the main character’s whole overarching theme is that he want’s to live life his way and therefore hurt who he wants and do what he wants. Meaning yes, the violence is violence for the sake of violence. It’s entertainment in this movie. Meaning it could have be alluded to, but the director wanted torture porn to keep freaks like you, David, entertained.

      Anyway David, Go get psychotherapy and apologize to every body in your life. Thanks <3

  3. Helihemis

    I disagree, I think you completely missed the entire point of the story but it is a unpopular opinion.
    Nice take.(not sarcasam)

    • Adam Brannon

      Thanks for your comments, as you said, this is part of our Unpopular Opinions series, so it’s expected there won’t be many out there that agree. I’ll pass on your thoughts to the author, Josh. Thanks again, Adam.

  4. Oslo

    Watching Clockwork Orange during this day and age is a breath of fresh out without all the movies trying to force Social Politics in for no reason. And not even good Social Politics just the mainstream things you see on the News everyday and seen in every single movie so it ends up being the same. So maybe I’m a bit bias because of all the movies coming a long sucking all the life of entertainment making it all the same.
    I respect your opinion but maybe watch the movie again and watch a few videos analyzing it or maybe read the book to get another view or others view
    Or maybe you’re sensitive to violent imagery, a lot of people are like that and that’s ok. If that’s the case then these movies aren’t for you.

    • Adam Brannon

      Thanks for your comments, this is part of our Unpopular Opinions series, so it’s expected there won’t be many out there that agree. I’ll pass on your thoughts to the author, Josh. Thanks so much for reading Movie Metropolis, Adam.

  5. Jean

    I completely agree! I just saw the movie today and I will say that many of the scenes were purely based on shock value. I ended the movie feeling uncomfortable and didn’t feel, and still don’t, like I took anything away from it. I watched the movie because it’s on the AFI’s Top 100 Films of All Time list, but outside of that I definitely don’t think I’ll be revisiting it again. I was consistently repulsed by the depiction of women, and every time a woman was on screen I cringed because the trend of this movie shows violence or objectitication towards them. Thanks for this review – now I know I’m not alone 🙂

  6. Grace

    I agree. From my perspective, this movie doesn’t really have a deeper meaning or value. It is sensationalized and the shock value scenes do little to add to the story. I think those who enjoy the film enjoy getting rises out of people rather than actual cinema. Although I think it is important to talk about violent subjects and to not hide away from the brutality of real-life situations, I do not think the graphicness of these scenes gives insight into any significant philosophy or human morality argument. In the end, I am not really questioning if Alex deserves the torture. Because of this, I believe that there are better ways of splitting the audience between supporting and condemning the protagonist than what was portrayed in the film.

    • moviemetropolisadmin

      Thanks so much for commenting Grace, this is such a fabulous take on this really divisive film and I really appreciate you sharing it. Thanks again and do continue to read Movie Metropolis – it’s people like you that keep us going, Adam!

  7. Sarah

    I agree, and I think “A Clockwork Orange” is probably the worst film Stanley Kubrick ever made. Does it have good cinematography? Yes. Does it have a unique visual design? Yes. Is he a talented director? Yes.
    But the characters are utterly detestable, yes, all of them.

    Now, I dont think there is anything wrong with violence in a film or having an antagonist as a main character, even a very cruel and amoral one, but the character at least has to be interesting and have something in their personality that the viewer can connect with, to understand the character’s perspectives on life and why they do what they do. This is why “Joker” worked so well as a film, and why Jack Torrance was so interesting to watch in “The Shining”.
    This is utterly lacking in Clockwork Orange. Alex is superficial, extremely boring and annoying. I kept wishing he would die. The other characters are no better.
    Everyone is either ignorant, weak, stupid, cowardly, or mean without any discernable motive. The whole society the people live in is just a bunch of myopic, morally hypocritical idiots who lack any awareness of themselves or the world around them.
    Whatever point the director was trying to communicate about social hypocracy was lost on me due to making me want to nuke all the annoying characters in this dated, stale stupid movie.

    If I wanted to watch a bunch of immoral characters in a film with tons of cruelty, murder, death and rape, there is always “Devils Rejects”, and it gives more bang for your buck with the blood.

  8. John Page

    I just can help but wonder how many people here have read the novel, or knew what personal events in Anthony Burgess’s life drove him to write it? These comments make it look like Kubrik wrote the story himself. In some ways, Kubrick toned down the shock value. (The narrator in the novel was 13.) Adam- I admire you for taking a stand that might get some push back — and taking the time to spell out why you didn’t like the film. Many people I highly respect can'[t handle it.

    But there are some themes in the film that go deeper- free will, art vs the animal side of man (the fight scene with the cat lady). I found Alex repellent at first, and it was even more shocking to find that he was the most likable person. I think it is his greatest film– but not one I’d recommend to everybody. But that is my opinion. Burgess said good and bad things about the film, but if you compare teh movie screen play to the novel, I think Kubrik did it justice.

    Just my opinion– but I respect yours as well

    • Adam Brannon

      Thanks for your comment John! I’ll be sure to pass your comments on to the author of the article. Thanks again, Adam!

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