A Clockwork Orange

What an absolute comeback. This film was once one of my favorite films ever and then it became an okay film after revisiting it and now after coming back to it I was wrong on some things. The pacing is excellent. I said last time that it suffered a lot, well I disagree now with myself and many other critics. I think the second half can be even somewhat more powerful than the first half since it shows how corrupt and twisted the society is. Stripping away completely Alex's free will leaves him to be dull and forced good. The core message of this film gets said right there when Alex's corrupted mind is being "cured" by the ludovico technique and by this his free will gets taken off and he's being forced to be good. The priest in this film says that the boy is not cured but just forcefully changed as a person and he's absolutely right. The first act is possibly one of the strongest first acts ever in history. Although I kind of prefer the second act of all acts the first act is by far the most technically skillful and manages to succeed in basically everything. After the first act and after Alex gets released from the ludivico technique during the second act B we shift from Alex being the villain to Alex being the... victim? Like it sounds crazy but that's the truth. This film manages to do somewhat a clever trick with turning the goverment into an villain and Alex into an victim. Even though he's an awful person and even when he's forced good, he's just still evil within just restrained from doing stuff. Like getting 300 volts everytime he tries something not allowed. He's not cured but restrained from doing so. But somehow this film manipulates the audience into feeling bad for Alex even though he's probably almost as bad as Hitler at this point. And that's the art of this film. Alex's character is just amazing. An perfect example of an evil human mind. And Malcolm McDowell brings his character to life perfectly. His performance is truly one of its kind. The thing with Alex is that he's an representation of sadistic, unwell and psychopathic mind. And that is something Kubrick brings to life in this film so well. He does such awful crimes that you actually feel sick to your stomach. But he's written in a way that manages to bypass bunch of other characters technical wise. The atmosphere is just perfect. The setting is a hyper-stylized dystopia. It's near future British dystopia with decaying brutalist estates and stark, minimalist gentrification. Pop-art colors, bizarre erotic sculptures and retro futuristic props give this film an dreamlike, almost cartoonish reality. And I'm almost 100% certain that that is why indeed I loved this film so much back when I was younger. It's just so visually pleasing to me. The final thing is the Wendy Carlos's score. It sounds so satisfying and that's reason the intro is probably my favorite intro of all time. It sounds so uncomfortable, nostalgic and fits the dream world so well. This is something that made the film because the score is used at so many parts. It's possibly my favorite parts of this film. A Clockwork Orange managed to make an appereance for my top 2 spot in my top 20 for now at least and that's crazy. Well its not because it was my top 4 back then for a reason but its certantly something I need to process for a while. This is Kubrick's best work. 10