Well, I admit I’ve never done that, ahem, research.
My impression was that they were playing the scene from Alex’s POV, similar to the “singing in the rain” thing with that other rape - that playing the music and speeding it up was supposed to make it seem (superficially) amusing (as no doubt it was for Alex). They at least appear to keep trying to put their clothes on and he keeps undressing them, in a sort of sinister Benny Hill - type sequence.
In any event it hardly matters whether that was consensual or not, as the guy is clearly established as a rapist and murderer in other scenes. I don’t think the movie downplays that he’s a vicious, amoral criminal.
Putting that in context: It derives ultimately from a cockney (I believe) expression, “queer as a clockwork orange.” (What could be queerer?) The phrase first enters the story when Alex and his droogs do a home-invasion, beat up the man and rape the woman. The man happens to be some sort of anarchist/libertarian political writer, who has been writing a book with the working title of A Clockwork Orange. Alex pulls a page out of the typewriter and mockingly reads it aloud for the droogs – the writer is comparing the imposition of rules on humanity, something meant to “juice at the bearded throat of God” IIRC, to turning an orange into clockwork. Which is essentially what the Ludovico treatment does to Alex. Later, after Alex is released from prison, and is beaten up by his droogs-now-cops (actually one of them is a former enemy, Billyboy), and ends up by sheer coincidence at that same writer’s house, he is able to claim to have heard of the man – “I have not read A Clockwork Orange, but I have heard of it.” (Rather a risk, since he has no actual knowledge that the book ever was finished and published, or, if so, published under that title, so claiming to have heard of it might well give him away; but it pays off, or appears to in the short run.)
It just now occurred to me for the first time ever that “Ludovico” is a cognate of “Ludwig,” as in Ludwig van Beethoven. (Also a cognate of Louie, Louie.) Also encodes “Vico,” though I doubt Burgess meant anything by that.
Burgess was a Joyce scholar with a special affinity for Finnegans Wake; I don’t doubt for a moment that he intended that reference. Also the multiple puns suggested by “ludo” (games, lewdness, also people–compare the Nadsat word “lewdies”).
All that I know about it is that it was a horrible movie to take a girl to on our first date. I’m surprised that she ever talked to me again after that.
Thanks for posting this - it has saved me the effort of actually reading it. And it transforms my opinion of Ager from an interesting but misguided critic to a total loon. I could go on for pages why his analysis of 2001 is 90% baloney.
As for Clockwork Orange, sure Alex agreed to the treatment to get out of prison. Sure the minister had ulterior motives. But how could the minister know it wasn’t going to work? He clearly was a politician, not a scientist. And if the whole thing was a fake, how come Alex experienced the unanticipated side effect of not being to stand Beethoven, which was not expected by anyone?
Ager really seems into Kubrick having a totally different purpose for each movie from what is on the screen. I need to go and read his Dr. Strangelove analysis - I bet it will be that the world did not end due to the Doomsday machine, but it was all a plot to get people into the mineshafts.
I was commenting on his post. I was not, however, limiting my remarks to the specific rape scene that you have been focusing on, and I think I was pretty clear about that.
I never said he wasn’t. I said that rape was depicted differently in the movie than in the book and that the extent of Alex’s crimes were toned down. Changing the ages of the girls he meets in the record store is an example of this.
His attack on the “cat lady” is also depicted rather differently than in the book. In the book she’s a grey-haired old woman with a room full of old fashioned portraits and religious art. Alex attacks her with a silver figurine that is probably a classical-style nymph or goddess. In the movie the woman has hair dyed bright red, is wearing a skin-tight costume, is in a room full of pornographic paintings, and Alex attacks her with an enormous penis sculpture. In other words, she’s depicted as a (to use Ashley Pomeroy’s words) “dirty woman”, while this was not the case in the book.
If it doesn’t matter then why was it changed for the movie? Stanley Kubrick must have had some reason for changing a scene where the protagonist very clearly rapes two little girls to a scene where the girls are teenagers and their willingness is at worst ambiguous (and I do not remember them looking like they were trying to escape rather than just starting to leave then changing their minds). While I cannot guess at Kubrick’s thought process, I am sure that many viewers felt more positively about Alex during this scene than they would have if he’d been shown getting two children drunk and raping them while they cried and struggled, as happens in the book.
You simply can’t think of any reason why a film-maker in 1971 might be leery of graphically depicting the rape of underage girls - other than that he wants to make his admittedly psychotic protagonist more appealing?
How about the desire not to get into lots and lots of trouble? Please note that even with the “toned down” version, trouble is just what the movie got, due to its (then) outrageous graphic violence and sexual violence.
They were obviously pushing the envelope as it was. I can’t imagine how they would have gotten away with doing as you suggest and very clearly depicting child-rape “as they cried and struggled”.
The film ran into all sorts of censorship issues, and was in fact withdrawn from distribution in Britian because of public reaction to its extreme sexual violence.
You’re the one who said it didn’t make any difference whether Alex raped the girls or not. And I didn’t say anything about Kubrick’s motivations, in fact I explicitly said that I did not know what his reasoning was. However, contrary to what you said, I believe these changes matter a lot when it comes to the audience’s reaction.
In my very first post in this thread, one you quoted and replied to, I said that Alex’s crimes may have been toned down due to concerns about getting the movie released.
I really do not know what your problem is, but in the future I would appreciate it if you took the time to actually read what I have written before you reply. If you don’t have the time, then don’t reply. I would honestly rather receive no reaction to my posts than have to keep repeating myself to someone who keeps claiming that I said things I did not say and ignoring what I actually did say.
Well, as to their age, remember that Alex is only 15 himself. In the book, that is. In the movie he appears significantly older – though that might be less a matter of bowdlerization and more a matter of Dawson casting.
Well, unless you wrote the script, if she’d blame you for the content of a movie, that relationship wouldn’t be worth continuing anyway. (And damn, is that ever representative of relationships in the early days of “women’s liberation”!)
No reason to get so very huffy and butthurt. I am merely attempting to make some sense of your position.
You said as follows:
So, what exactly is your point? You appear to be claiming that the scene changed the audience’s reactions to make Alex appear more appealing, and you preface it with “Stanley Kubrick must have had some reason for changing a scene …” [emphasis added]. What exactly are you attempting to say, if not to imply that (standard disclaimer that you can’t know for sure aside) Kubrick appears to be toning the scene down to make Alex more appealing than he otherwise would have been?
Perhaps rather than reasoning by inuendo, you could come right out and say why exactly you think Kubrick changed the scene, and why you think this change is significant. With less unnecessary personal anger, please. You can take it as a given that we cannot know for certain what motivated him, and all this is in the realm of opinion.
I do not believe that you are putting the slightest effort into understanding my position, which is a simple and (I thought) non-controversial one: there are differences between the book and movie versions of A Clockwork Orange. I have no idea why someone who has not even read the book is so determined to argue with me about whether, how, or why this is true.
The innuendo exists only in your imagination, I do not know or care what Kubrick’s motivations were, and I have already explained why I think the change is significant. I have nothing to gain by continuing to repeat myself to someone who is plainly not interested in what I have to say. I do not know what you’re getting out of this exchange, but I am not going to play the strawman in whatever dialogue you already have planned out in your head. If you actually have anything interesting to say about this movie then you can say it without my participation.
As you can plainly see, I’m not arguing that there was a change. I am inquiring as to why it is significant. In effect to address your question: “If it doesn’t matter then why was it changed for the movie? Stanley Kubrick must have had some reason for changing a scene …”.
You are, of course, free to pick up your ball and go home. I will note that you have worked yourself into a rage over nothing.
Me too. In fact, I like the book better without the last chapter, like Kubrick used. Alex is cured. Is that a good thing? He loves being good now. He’s also a mechanical mind in a biological body. He was bad before, but he had free will and enjoyed himself and had emotions. He used that enjoyment for horrible things. But now he’s not entirely a person. Is it worth it? Which side should society err on? It’s one of the few novels I truly found deep.
Around then is probably the time it would be most likely to be acceptable, certainly far more so than any time before 1968, or any time after the mid 80s.
I think somebody needs to set up a Movie Court website where people can indict, try, convict, and punish fictional characters of criminal offences. And separately indict, try, and convict writers, directors and actors for the portrayal of same.
Let them get it out of their systems that way, instead of having it cloud their attempts at film critique.
