Clockwork orange

[Guest]

I just saw this for the first time.  Now I usually like the whole "interpret the ending as you interpret it" kind of ending, as it leaves the ending open for suggestion. However, those endings usually only work when a story is not straightfoward.  In a movie like Clockwork Orange, where the story is very straightfoward (it may not seem like it, but it is), it doesn't seem to make much sense to make an ending like that, as there's no true conclusion.  Sure you're able to find the conclusion from the rest of the movie, but it never truly seems to end, and while that may have been the idea, I don't think it makes too much sense.

[Guest]

Although the ending was not the same ending as the original Burgess work (Alex gets a new band of droogs and decides that settling down is more fulfilling than wanton vandalism and violence), it's called IRONY!!!

 

He was conditioned to hate sex, correct? He was "cured," right? So when he's envisioning sex and says "I was cured all right," put the pieces together. It's terribly pessimistic, saying that people are naturally impure and downright evil sometimes. Burgess couldn't stand the American version's ending.

[Guest]

Of course it's pessimistic.  When Alex jumps out the window to kill himself he accidently destroys all the effects of his treatment.  That's why when the nurse shows him the slideshow, his answers are more along the lines of something he would say at the beginning of the movie.  I think it's supposed to be interpreted as "When Alex leaves the hospital the cycle will start all over again".  When a movie is supposed to be an allegory, it should have a straightfoward ending so everyone can see the true moral of the story alot more clearly, and not one that's open to suggestion.

[Guest]

I don't know what it's an allegory of, but I'm just getting my information from the foreword written by Burgess. He isn't Kubrick or anyone else who worked on the movie, so he may have had a different idea of how the ending was shown.

[Guest]

I interpret it as an allegory of society and of what may come in the future.  While we'd all like too live in a society where the bad can just be 'erased', it simply isn't possible.  A society without evil is completely amoral, as evil stems from the heart of man.  Also, it shows how as human beings we are not able to function without the ability to act at will and on instinct.  This is shown in the 2nd half of the movie, when Alex is in great need to defend himself, but can do nothing because of his treatment.  I haven't read the novel yet, so maybe the ending is better in the book.

[Guest]

Believe me, the novel is much more engaging than the movie, which is hard to even fathom considering how good the movie is.

[Guest J*ingus]

This is shown in the 2nd half of the movie, when Alex is in great need to defend himself, but can do nothing because of his treatment.  

One problem: Alex has done horrific wrongs to all of the people he needs "to defend himself" against in the 2nd half.  He's a brutal, violent, raping, murdering bastard, and his former victims take the chance to strike back at him for his evil crimes.  I don't give one shit whether or not something done to him was cruel, he thoroughly deserves it all.

[Guest]

That's where karma comes into play.  My point was if the treatment didn't have those effects then Alex would have defended himself against the people he did horrible things to.

 

Also what's up with the whole obsession of Beethoven thing?  Was that in the novel or did Kubrick just throw it in there?

[Guest]

No, that was in te book also. He's also much more passionate about it in the book.

[Guest]

Another question- what drugs (if any) do you think 'synthemesc' and 'drencrum' are supposed to be?  The only thing I could come up with is coke, cause it makes you really hyper.

[Guest]

Synthemesc is Mescaline, and Drencrum is probably cocaine.

[Guest evenflowDDT]

Damn, I was gonna reply but you two hit the nail on the head already, all the way down to it not being the original ending of the book.  Actually, since I have an early American publication, the ending is the same as the movie, since it wasn't released with its original ending in America until a few years after its original publication.  I always wondered why that was... I think the original ending shows that there's hope for everyone and that "good" will always overcome "evil" in the end.

[Guest Ozymandias]

The fall didn't erase his conditioning it was done by the doctors themselves because of what a PR nightmare it had become. Remember Alex's dream about doctors fooling around with his brain? That was it.

 

The original US edition had the correct ending instead of Burgess' candy-ass cop-out. Really now, the sociopath just decides out of the fuckin' blue to "play nice" from now on? Bullshit. It's a cop-out because Burgess was too big of a puss to have an ambiguous, creepy, "negative" ending. Kubrick and the US publisher were correct. That last chapter is a joke.

[Guest El Satanico]

Well then i'm glad that Kubrick didn't end it like the book. This movie just wouldn't be the same with a happy feel good ending. It probably wouldn't had been as good either.

[Guest]

Gee, let's crucify Burgess for wanting to have an optimistic ending.

 

And have you actually read that last chapter? He doesn't just decide out of the blue. He realizes that his life is empty and perhaps growing up would fill the void, because his old droogs have all done it themselves, why not him also?

[Guest evenflowDDT]

I wouldn't call Burgess' ending a cop-out ending at all.  Alex acts the way he does in the book because he is essentially bored with "normal, law-abiding" life (at least that's how I interpreted it).  When his current life becomes boring, where else does he have to turn but to himself, where he realizes how much of a mistake his reckless, violent nature was, and to try and live the "normal life" he had originally become so bored with.  Plus, even though I haven't read the original ending, I believe it doesn't happen right away, but when he's older, which shows even more that it's maturity more than anything else.

 

...but then what does Burgess know about his character, he's just the author, right?

[Guest Ravenbomb]

I haven't read the book, so I'm not going to say which I like better. But I do like the movie ending. It makes sense that if they undid the programming that was done to him that he'd revert back to his old self.

[Guest Ozymandias]

"Gee, let's crucify Burgess for wanting to have an optimistic ending"

 

I think it's justified considering how rude and childish Burgess was in the intro to the complete US edition, ("A Clockwork Orange Resucked") bad-mouthing the US publishing company and especially Kubrick himself, castigating them for "profiting from their crimes." CRIMES!

 

I have read the last chapter, and I read it along with the whole book so I'm not judging it out of context. It was tacked on and innapropriate. I know that Burgess tried to explain it, but it didn't work. It completely betrayed the character and the rythym of the book. Reading it I got the impression that he wrote the book, decided it was too scary and needed a happy ending, and just added some lame rationalizing to explain said ending. That's how it felt to me in comparison to the whole book.

 

 

"...but then what does Burgess know about his character, he's just the author, right?"

 

Well see, that's the problem. He was too close to this particular character and was unwilling to just let him be the true evil that he is. He clearly felt affectionatly towards Alex and felt some weird need to "redeem" him. So yes, in this instance, I think I DO know better, because I have the emotional detachment and objectivity which Burgess was completely lacking here.

[Guest evenflowDDT]

"...but then what does Burgess know about his character, he's just the author, right?"

 

Well see, that's the problem. He was too close to this particular character and was unwilling to just let him be the true evil that he is. He clearly felt affectionatly towards Alex and felt some weird need to "redeem" him. So yes, in this instance, I think I DO know better, because I have the emotional detachment and objectivity which Burgess was completely lacking here.

I still don't think Alex is intrinsically "pure evil", and is acting more out of boredom and having no other way to express that than out of any real "evil" intentions.  I also don't think that that ending necessarily "redeems" Alex.  There's no denying he still did all those horrible things, but it just admits that people can change.  I do understand what you're saying though, I just don't agree with it.