MY MOVIE SHELF: A Clockwork Orange

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 101 Days to go: 67

Movie #339:  A Clockwork Orange

Sometimes there’s a reason I haven’t gotten around to seeing a movie. A Clockwork Orange came out before my time, but I’ve heard it discussed over the years. Most of that discussion centered around Alex (Malcolm McDowell) and the brutal violence he and his friends perpetrate. I’m not a fan of brutal violence, nor am I a huge fan of director Stanley Kubrick, so I opted out. Until now.

A Clockwork Orange isn’t as hard to watch as I feared. Despite a disturbingly cavalier attitude toward rape and sexual violence, most of the brutality happens off-screen or is given a cheeky veneer. It doesn’t make it less awful — it almost makes it conceptually more awful, actually — but the depictions on screen aren’t especially graphic. So while I was put off by the film, at least I wasn’t grossed out by it.

Rather than being hard to watch, actually, A Clockwork Orange is instead hard to listen to and comprehend. I estimate about 60% of the words spoken are complete nonsense, and even with the closed captioning on, it could be incredibly hard to follow. (My apologies if these words are legitimate British jargon, but somehow I doubt it. It’s crazily exaggerated jibber-jabber, like if Tom Haverford was a new-age hooligan.) The film is clearly making a statement about youth culture, along with violence and psychiatry and politics and the legal system and juvenile delinquency and probably a slew of other things, but I confess I’m not sure what that statement is. “We’re all fucked,” maybe? It’s Kubrick, so, entirely possible.

One thing I’m fairly certain of, though, based on the ever-changing hair color of Alex’s mom (Sheila Raynor), is that she’s likely the great-aunt of Effie Trinket, meaning the dystopian near-future of A Clockwork Orange is simply a precursor to the dystopian future of Panem. It tracks, too, because all the psychological experimentation, cruel prison system, and raging eccentricities of the populace could easily morph into those of the Capitol.

A Clockwork Orange was released in 1971, based on the book of the same name that came out in the previous decade, and around that time, treatises on government, free will and totalitarianism were at the forefront of the cultural landscape, so I guess you could say the film is a product of its time, tapping into the social unrest and revolutionary attitudes of entire movements. That landscape has changed drastically in the last forty years, however, so I’m not sure it makes the same impact as it once did. Then again, with certain factions of our society excusing the use of torture and police brutality in certain instances, perhaps the film is more timely than its era and setting might suggest.

The thing is, I could see people reacting to the movie in any number of ways, with a broad spectrum of emotions and insights. Whether positively or negatively, A Clockwork Orange sparks a reaction. It generates discussion and debate. In truth, that might be the most successful thing about it, and what makes it such a classically noteworthy film. Whatever else it does, it definitely makes one think.

 

MY MOVIE SHELF: Easy A

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 282  Days to go: 274

Movie #95: Easy A

If someone is ambitious enough to sift through my Twitter archives, they’ll eventually come across the time I watched Easy A something like six times in a weekend. It’s kind of addictingly great.

Mostly I focused on how Penn Badgley sounds like the name of a Muppet instead of some super charming, adorably hot guy playing Woodchuck Todd (wait, maybe he is a Muppet), but then it was pointed out to me that all the actors from Gossip Girl have ridiculously cartoonish names. Leighton Meester? Are we sure that’s not a genus of ferrets?

Anyway, Woodchuck Todd sort of hangs around the edges of the movie until the end. The real star is, of course, Emma Stone as Olive Penderghast. Olive is a funny, quick-witted and hyper-literate girl who is stuck in the bowels of Ojai Northern High School (home of the former Blue Devils, now Woodchucks, because we wouldn’t want to cheer for Satan) where no one notices her at all until a series of deceptions (some intentional, some less so) leaves her with a very bad reputation. (True story: When I started this one up tonight, my son asked me what it was about. I said it’s about a girl in high school with a bad reputation, which made me realize Olive Penderghast is like the modern Cha-Cha DiGregorio of Ojai Northern High School, with less dancing.)

Aside from misusing the term “ironically” and saying “could care less” instead of “couldn’t,” Olive is whip-smart and all of us should aspire to be her. So sayeth Buzzfeed. Actually, I would like to go back in time to be her when I was in high school, particularly if it meant I could have Patricia Clarkson and Stanley Tucci as my parents because they are fantastic.

The whole cast is actually tops, from the aforementioned Clarkson and Tucci being the best parents anyone could ever ask for in life (really, I want them to get married just so some children would benefit from that pairing), to a nicely matured Thomas Haden Church as super cool English teacher Mr. Griffith, to a pre-crazy Amanda Bynes as an uber-Christian Mean Girl. (Honorable mentions also go out to my beloved Cougar Town‘s Dan Byrd as Brandon, Lisa Kudrow as Mrs. Griffith, Malcolm McDowell as the scariest principal in a non-horror movie, plus literally everyone else because the whole cast is great.)

Olive’s bad reputation leads to some extensive Scarlet Letter cosplay, which is a hell of a lot of fun, but, after a sexy musical number for no reason, she sets the record straight on a live webcast, as of course every kid would do. She also has excellent taste in the ’80s movies she wants her life to imitate (Say Anything, Can’t Buy Me Love, Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off — I can only assume this is the excellent parenting of Clarkson and Tucci at work), and Brandon gets to do a little Huckleberry Finn cosplay of his own. (“My apologies to Mark Twain.”)

The really excellent thing about Easy A, though, on top of all the other excellent things about Easy A, is that for all the gossip and ostracizing and mistreatment done on behalf of Olive’s unearned bad reputation, the actuality of her eventually having sex is never treated like a bad thing — not by her, not by her parents, not even by her favorite teacher. It’s something that society puts standards and expectations around but which Olive’s inner circle (with the exception of BFF Rhiannon (Aly Michalka), who buys into the hype) never once treats with anything but the utmost maturity and understanding. I really, really like that, and I wish more movies sent that message to girls, that sexuality is normal and healthy and perfectly okay, even if you struggle with different aspects of it from time to time.

Whenever, however, and with whomever it eventually happens, it’s “nobody’s goddamn business.” Never forget that, folks.