I did not like it. I understood that it was very famous and often referenced, but my dad didn’t tell me before we got it what it was about.
I sat through the whole thing, but found it… just sort of icky. The sex and violence was a little overwhelming. I kind of… decided my dog was really interesting and in need of attention during the rape scenes. Plus, I was watching it with my dad… who wants to watch a movie with that much sex in it with a parent?
I did appreciate the story, though. I thought it was interesting and I liked that I understood all the references after I saw it.
I’ll have to see if I can get my dad to rent it again now that I’m older. It might still be too much and it might be too much in different ways now, but… well, I can always become suddenly very interested in the dogs every time something comes on that I’d rather tune out.
Female, watched in college, have a vague recollection of liking it. (To be honest, I’ve never in my life found any movie disturbing, ever – and I kind of wish I did, because this means I don’t get the point of horror movies at all. It’s on a screen, it’s imaginary, it’s distant – I don’t even have the sort of visceral reaction I get when reading a really good piece of fiction.)
That’s the one scene where I think Burgess was completely right in his criticism of the movie. I the book, it’s a really ugly scene, and the girls are 13 or 14.
Contrary to the rules of the SDMB, I have not read the previous posts.
I refuse to watch it. I attempted to almost 20 years ago and the extreme distaste repels me to this day. I’m not sure what I saw that caused it, but it certainly left a strong enough impression that I absolutely refuse to watch it, or even read discussions about it.
No other movie has done that. Well, Showgirls, but I’m pretty sure for other reasons.
I agree very much, especially on the “not sympathizing with the protagonist” part and that last sentence. On the bastardization of the novel I don’t really know, because I haven’t read the whole book and also only a translation of it. I’m a male, and I can watch the film, but I’m not a fan of it. Not because of the rape scene, which isn’t even a rape scene in a technical sense, but because of the dated style of the film. I also feel there’s an unhealthy amount of over acting on Malcolm McDowell’s part with all those silly facial expressions.
Burgess also apparently grew to hate the film, or at least Kubrick, according to this piece. He also hadn’t liked Kubrick’s adaptation of Lolita since he felt “Kubrick had found no cinematic equivalent to Nabokov’s literary extravagance”.
Saw it in 1982 Behavior Disorders Psych class. Laughed hystically. Best female friend despised it & everything Malcolm McDowellish (except his H.G. Wells in Time After Time, which she did not recognize as him) from that time onward… and wasn’t too fond of the Glorious Ninth of Ludwig Van afterwards either. That movie practically worked a Ludovico Technique on her. I’ve had other female friends who didn’t mind it a bit. Oh, and also Mom.
the fight with the rival droogs to “The Thieving Magpie”
the William Tell Overture orgy (in the movie, there is no suggestion
the girls are pre-teen or that Alex is supposed to be only 16)
the fight with the older lady UNTIL he slams the phallus down
the Ludivico Technique & public demonstration afterwards
F. Alexander’s revenge
the finale’ - “I was cured all right”
I watched it last in my mid-twenties and liked it- the violence bothered me but it felt necessary for the story. I’m not a woman that gets more bothered by violence against a man vs. woman vs. kid vs. adorable dog, etc more so than any other kind of violence. It’s all bad to me but if it’s necessary to the point of the story- I can stand it. I usually look away at any graphic bloody scenes if I look away at anything.
I liked the movie for it’s style, the language/dialogue (though can’t remember much except some goofy words) and the moral of the story which I only vaguely remember almost twenty years later. I’d watch it again but I do think I don’t look back on it as one of my favorites- just a movie I appreciated at a time when I was exploring watching more than mainstream fare. I read the book as well but only know I liked it well enough.
I watched in college with the understanding that it was supposed to be a work of genius, and was thoroughly unimpressed. It seemed more like gratuitous violence and exploitation to me than making some important Moral Point, not in the pearl-clutching sense but in the roll-eyes sense. I mean, it was so over the top, and I was watching it in 2001 so the 70s vibe was totally dated. It began my lifetime love affair with hating Kubrick.
It didn’t trigger any running away screaming reactions, though. Just a lot of ''oh God is this movie over yet?"
Sexual violence in films for some reason is not as triggering to me as torture in films. I refuse to watch Reservoir Dogs. I had to leave the theater twice during Pan’s Labyrinth just because somebody was about to get tortured. The only sexual thing that really freaked me out is the end of Oldboy.
The main character is set up for this elaborate incest-based revenge plot in which he ends up falling in love with his (unbeknownst to him) daughter and taking her virginity. When the villain reveals to him his paramour’s true identity, he freaks out and cuts out his own tongue, and in the end he chooses to suppress his memory somehow and he and his daughter live as lovers. It’s pretty messed up, and, at least for me, it’s a ‘‘twist’’ I never saw coming in a film that was otherwise just an extraordinarily violent action/mystery… so I was completely unprepared for dealing with all that.
I saw it back in the day, when it was a must-see at the local ‘art film theater’. Didn’t bother me that much, but then I’m not a typical finicky sensitive female going ‘ew ew ew’ at unpleasantness and waving my long-fingernailed hands in the air. I’ve seen it several times over the years, and I do still find scenes disturbing to watch, but not inordinately so. The music is just heavenly, and I think Malcolm McDowell is mesmerizing.
I saw it in a college, as part of a Kubrick film series. It’s the only Kubrick film in the series that I remember nothing about, so I was either completely horrified or utterly bored. I think I was bored.
You want ultraviolence, watch The Cook The Thief His Wife and Her Lover.
