A Clockwork Orange

A Clockwork Orange

Stanley Kubrick's striking visual interpretation of Anthony Burgess's famous novel is a masterpiece. Malcolm McDowell delivers a clever, tongue-in-cheek performance as Alex, the leader of a quartet of droogs, a vicious group of young hoodlums who spend their nights stealing cars, fighting rival gangs, breaking into people's homes, and raping women. While other directors would simply exploit the violent elements of such a film without subtext, Kubrick maintains Burgess's dark, satirical social commentary. We watch Alex transform from a free-roaming miscreant into a convict used in a government experiment that attempts to reform criminals through an unorthodox new medical treatment. The catch, of course, is that this therapy may be nothing better than a quick cure-all for a society plagued by rampant crime. A Clockwork Orange works on many levels--visual, social, political, and sexual--and is one of the few films that hold up under repeated viewings. Kubrick not only presents colorfully arresting images, he also stylizes the film by utilizing classical music (and Wendy Carlos's electronic classical work) to underscore the violent scenes, which even today are disturbing in their display of sheer nihilism. Ironically, many fans of the film have missed that point, sadly being entertained by its brutality rather than being repulsed by it. --Bryan Reesman

Year:
1971
19,145 Views
Being the adventures of a young man ---who couldn't resist pretty girls ...or a bit of the old ultra-violence ...went to jail ...was re-conditioned ...and came out a different young man ...or was he?
Being the adventures of a young man whose principal interests are rape, ultra-violence and Beethoven
The breakthrough presentation of Stanley Kubrick's Clockwork Orange for the millions who were not allowed to see it until now!

Minister:
[as he feeds Alex morsels of food] We tried to help you. We followed recommendations which were made to us that turned out to be wrong. An inquiry will place the responsibility where it belongs. We want you to regard us as friends. We put you right. You are getting the best of treatment. We never wished you harm, but there are some who did, and do, and I think you know who those are. There are certain people who wanted to use you for political ends. They would have been glad to have you dead, for they thought they could then blame it all on the Government. There is also a certain man, a writer of subversive literature, who has been howling for your blood. He has been mad with desire to stick a knife into you but you are safe from him now. We put him away. He found out that you had done wrong to him. At least he believed you had done wrong. He formed this idea in his head that you had been responsible for the death of someone near and dear to him. He was a menace. We put him away for his own protection, and also for yours...We are interested in you and when you leave here you will have no worries. We shall see to everything - a good job on a good salary.

Alex:
What job and how much?

Minister:
You must have an interesting job with a salary which you would regard as adequate, not only for the job that you're going to do, and in compensation for what you believe you have suffered, but also because you are helping us.

Alex:
Helping you, sir?

Minister:
We always help our friends, don't we? It is no secret that this Government has lost a lot of popularity because of you, my boy. There are some who think that at the next election, we shall be out. The press has chosen to take a very unfavourable view of what we tried to do. But public opinion has a way of changing, and you, Alex -- if I may call you Alex?

Alex:
Certainly, sir. what do they call you at home?

Minister:
My name is Frederick. As I was saying, Alex, you can be instrumental in changing the public's verdict. Do you understand, Alex? Do I make myself clear?

Alex:
As an unmuddied lake, Fred. As clear as an azure sky of deepest summer. You can rely on me, Fred.

Cat Lady:
Oh sh*t. Who's there?

Alex:
Excuse me, missus, can you please help? There's been a terrible accident. Can I please use your telephone for an ambulance?

Cat Lady:
I'm frightfully sorry. There is a telephone in the Public House about a mile down the road. I suggest you use that.

Alex:
But, missus, this is an emergency. It's a matter of life and death. Me friend's lying in the middle of the road bleeding to death.

Cat Lady:
I'm very sorry but I never open the door to strangers after dark.

Alex:
Very well, madam. I suppose you can't be blamed for being suspicious with so many scoundrels and rouges of the night about. Dim, bend down. I'm gonna get in that window and open the front door.

Cat Lady:
Hello, Radlett Police Station. Good evening. It's Miss Weathers at Woodmere Health Farm... I'm frightfully sorry to bother you but something rather odd has just happened... Well, it's probably nothing at all, but you never know... Well, a young man ring the bell asking to use the telephone... He said there had been some kind of accident. The thing that caught my attention was what he said รณ the words he used, sounded exactly like what was quoted in the papers this morning in connection with the writer and his wife who were assaulted last night... Well, just a few minutes ago... Well, if you think that's necessary, but, well, I'm quite sure he's gone away now. Oh... alright. Fine. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Alex:
Hi, hi, hi there! At last we meet. Our brief govoreet through the letter-hole was not, shall we say, satisfactory, yes?

Cat Lady:
Who are you? How the hell did you get in here? What the bloody hell d'you think you're doing?

Alex:
[sees a phallic sculpture on a table] Naughty, naughty, naughty, you filthy old soomka.

Cat Lady:
Now listen here, you little bastard, just you turn around and walk out of here the same way as you came in. Leave that alone! Don't touch it! It's a very important work of art. [Alex rocks the statue back and forth] What the bloody hell do you want?

Alex:
Well, to be perfectly honest, madam, I'm taking part in an international students' contest to see who can get the most points for selling magazines.

Cat Lady:
Cut the sh*t, sonny, and get out of here before you get yourself into some very serious trouble. [Alex rocks the statue again] I told you to leave that alone! Now get out of here before I throw you out! Wretched slummy bedbug. I'll teach you to break into real people's houses. [swings a bust of Beethoven at him] F***ing little bastard!

[the two fight; Alex is hit in the head, then beats her unconscious with the sculpture]

Alex Delarge:
[voiceover] And viddy films, I would. Where I was taken to, brothers, was like no sinny I ever viddied before. I was bound up in a straitjacket and my gulliver was strapped to a headrest with like wires running away from it. Then they clamped like lidlocks on my eyes so that I could not shut them no matter how hard I tried. It seemed a bit crazy to me, but I let them get on with what they wanted to get on with. If I was to be a free young malchick again in a fortnight's time, I would put up with much in the meantime, O my brothers. So far, the first film was a very good, professional piece of sinny, like it was done in Hollywood. The sounds were real horrorshow. You could slooshy the screams and moans very realistic, and you could even get the heavy breathing and panting of the tolchocking malchicks at the same time. And then, what do you know, soon our dear old friend, the red, red vino on tap, the same in all places like it's put out by the same big firm, began to flow. It was beautiful. It's funny how the colours of the real world only seem really real when you viddy them on the screen. Now all the time I was watching this, I was beginning to get very aware of like not feeling all that well, and this I put down to all the rich food and vitamins, but I tried to forget this, concentrating on the next film which jumped right away on a young devotchka who was being given the old in-out, in-out first by one malchick, then another, then another...When it came to the sixth or seventh malchick, leering and smecking and then going into it, I began to feel really sick. But I could not shut my glazzies. And even if I tried to move my glazz-balls about, I still could not get out of the line of fire of this picture.


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