In 'A Clockwork Orange' directed by Stanley Kubrick, the spectator is affected by being forced to align with the central character Alex, a mentally deranged sociopath. Throughout the film, the spectator watches scenes of Alex performing and enjoying acts of violence and rape. However, Alex is positioned in the film as the narrator in a linear narrative which means that the spectator see the film from his perspective and are compelled to sympathise with him. The film is also visually symbolic of Alex's own disturbed and sociopathic outlook on the world.
In the first twenty minutes of the film, The character Alex is introduced to the spectator along with his gang members, which he calls his droogs. The audience is shown Alex and his droogs physically assaulting an old homeless man, they have a brawl with another similar gang in a old casino, they steal a car and drive recklessly down the countryside causing other cars to crash before finally stopping at a old writer's house where they break in, beat the writer crippling him and rape his wife. Whilst the audience watch the scenes, classical music plays over the top of the scenes, for example Beethoven, which when combined with the film's surreal near future setting make the violence seem stylised and strange. This constant stream of violent images with classical music played over them straight from the start of the movie is metaphorically similar to Alex's Ludovico technique he experiences in the film, where he is subject to violent images whilst strapped into a cinema seat. The positioning of this metaphorical Ludovico treatment for the spectator is to desensitise them, much like how Alex is desensitised to violence because he is a sociopath. Kubrick does this because he wants the spectator to reject an association or any alignment with Alex because he is performing violent acts.
It is not until the second part of the film where Alex's develops a physical aversion for violence or conflict after his Ludovico treatment where we begin to sympathise with him. The film's narrative in the second part is similar to how it was in the first part of the film. Firstly, Alex is thrown out of his home by his parents and their new lodger, he is recognised by the homeless man he beat earlier in the film who take his things and beat him. Then, his former droogs, Georgie and Dim, are revealed to become police officers and drive him to the middle of the woods, where he is nearly drowned. This drowning sequence is similar to how Alex throws them into the water during the first part of the film when they are walking across the marina. In pain, he comes across the old writers home who doesn't recognise him at first but after hearing Alex sing 'Singing in the rain' which was sung during his wife's rape, the writer locks Alex in a room whilst playing 'Beethoven's 9th' through speakers, knowing that as a byproduct of the Ludovico technique, Alex is physically averse to the song. Unable to take anymore, he throws himself out of the window in a attempt to commit suicide. This seemingly karmic sequence of events are an attempt to make the spectator align with Alex and feel sympathy for him, for example, the use of non-diagetic sad music during the scene where he is thrown out by his parents. We also see the writer character taking pleasure in Alex's torment when he is locked in the room, mirroring Alex's own love of violence and Beethoven in the first part of the film.
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| The drowning scene shows the karmic nature of the film. Alex has been made 'to suffer when others have suffered.' |
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| Him doing the same thing earlier in the film. |
Depending on the spectators own extra-textual experiences, the character Alex is purposely made to be dislikable in the first part of the film, the spectator is supposed to take a oppositional reading into the character of Alex who clearly enjoys violence and rape along with classical music and is depicted as a sociopath with no moral compass. However the second part of the film challenges this oppositional reading of Alex by making the audience feel sympathetic towards him in that he is submitted to the same violent behaviour that he caused to others in the first part of the film.
The film is also visually distinctive in order to portray Alex as the narrator of the film. The film's stylised violence accompanied with the score of classical music shows Alex's fascination with art and sexual violence. This juxtaposition between art and sexual violence is notable in the fight scene in the abandoned shot. The establishing shot of the scene is a mural of flowers on top of the stage before the camera zooms out to show Billy boy's gang raping a woman. Another example is the scene in Alex's bedroom where it is implied he masturbates to the small crucified Jesus figurines, accompanied with Beethoven's 9th symphony and jump cuts to the hands, feet and genitals of the figurines. The use of stock footage further reinforces that Alex is masturbating to violence.
The mis-en-scene of the film is depicted as surreal and over-sexualised. In the very first scene in the Korova milk bar, the tables in the film are white naked woman figurines on four legs. The costumes Alex and his droogs wear costumes that accentuate their groin. The milk dispensers in the bar dispense milk out of a naked figurines nipple. The masks Alex and his droogs wear during the break in are phallic in nature. The lobby of Alex's apartment building has been vandalised with numerous penis drawn onto the mural,showing a further juxtaposition of sex and art. Another example is the two girls that Alex picks up at the record shop and he has a threesome with them in which is stylised because it is filmed in extreme fast forward. The cat lady's house which Alex and his Droogs break into is full of sexual imagery, including a big penis statue that the cat lady is very protective over. When Alex rams the big penis into the cat lady's face killing her, it is followed by a jump cut of a picture of a screaming woman with two sets of teeth. This sets a subtext in the film because it implies that Alex's parents used to abuse him. Alex's mother has a set of false teeth, and this is the reason why Alex has a lock on his bedroom door, to keep a physical barrier between himself and his parents. This is further implied through the scene with Deltoid on the bed where he grabs Alex by the balls, putting him into a similar position to the Korova milk bar tables, implying this is a place where Alex has been sexualised.
In the second part of the film, this violent and sexual imagery is not as noticeable. This is because it shows that Alex has been cured by the Ludovico treatment and that he is physically averse to violence and sexual violence. The use of central and a-central imagining to show the difference between the two parts of the film. For example, the first part of the film features a lot of central imagining. The scene where Alex is drowned by Georgie and Dim features a strange synth noise after every hit from the baton. We also see people getting beaten and women being raped in the first part of the film which is stylised through the use of Beethoven and other classical music used. A example of A-central imagining is when the old writer tortures Alex using the 9th symphony played through speakers. The camera zooms out on his face to reveal his pleasure at the torment accompanied by the classical music. This implies that the old writer has become what Alex in the first part of the film, the same zoom out effect is used similar to the first scene of the film where the camera zooms out on Alex.
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| the first shot of the film. Establishes Alex as menacing from the get go. |
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| Similar close up. The writer also looks like Beethoven. |
It can be implied that after Alex is submitted to the same torture that the Old man is enduring, he recognises himself in his own behaviour and kills himself in guilt or to make the pain stop. This affects the spectator because it makes the film visually different on a sub-conscious level to give Kubrick the affect he wants. He wants the audience to not align with Alex in the first half of the film and then align in sympathy for him in the second half of the film. By taking away the strange and surreal visual imagery that Alex sees during the first half, it makes Alex more associable with the spectator.
