joeorewan

Let me start with a little autobiographical information. One day, I wanted to see "A Clockwork Orange" because I heard it was an awesome movie. But, I decided it would be more spiritually rewarding to read the book before I watched the movie. At this same time, I was assigned a research paper for English class, and I decided to do it on "A Clockwork Orange". So, I read "A Clockwork Orange" in detail, studied the Nadsat language of the malchicks'. I read criticisms, more criticms, analytical essays. And then, I decide, ah gee, I'm going to watch this movie. And yes, I am an avid movie watcher and I claim to know what I'm talking about when I say this or more correctly write this. Stanley Kubrick's "A Clockwork Orange" is a perversion of the novel. He deep down wanted to make a porn and decided he's going to interject it within the story of "A Clockwork Orange". What was the point of the sexually explicit material? There is no connection between it and the novel by Anthony Burgess. There wasn't sex in his story, there was rape and the ravaging of innocence. There was nothing sexy about it. So why then do these big chested, curvy Playboy bunny-type women "get raped" with little to no struggle (I think one assisted in taking her clothes off) and in the book they are 10-11 year old girls who have yet to have big breasts and gorgeous hips. A minor detail overlooked by a director's arrogant vision. And then there's the old lady who is brutally attacked (then murdered) by Alex. Very old and decrepid in the book with no capability of defending herself except with her copious amounts of cats (I think I saw five in the movie, in the book there was like twenty). In the movie she is limber, probably early 50's and is killed by a giant phallic symbol. In the book, it was a bust of Beethoven. It was so significant to have the music destroy this lady, not this huge phallus. What is the point? The point is, o my brothers, is that Kubrick I believe is a sexist man who wants his victimized women to be dominated by large maleness (aka ceramic phallus). I will admit one thing good that this movie accomplished, the comedic tone of the book. The lightness of the language and Malcom MacDowell captured the humor well, BUT he was too old to be Alex. Alex is fifteen which makes it all the more CREEPIER. The actors were too old to be playing a gang of teenagers. Hmm, what else....oh yes the violence and the underlying theme of freedom of choice. The violence, not at all shocking, but then again I've grown up to "pulp fiction". Not that I need the in-your-face style, but I think that's what Kubrick was going for. He doesn't leave it for the imagination, but fails at providing grotesque imagery that would make you feel sickened by the violence. And the freedom of choice, yes the prison chaplain has his famous line, but I think the ultimate point of this movie is lost in once again Kubrick's obsession with sex. If you want Kubrick-directed naked people I suggest "Eyes Wide SHut". At least then I get the point. But here, he fails. He doesn't do enough justice to the book. He strays from the Anthony Burgess's vision too far. Sure, it's more faithful than a lot of Hollywood's book adaptations, but it could have been done so much better. This book was practically begging to be made into a movie with it's already picked-out soundtrack. But I honestly feel that if people read the book before jumping on the hype band wagon back in the '70's, we wouldn't look at this movie with such awe.

I've repeatedly watched this movie to find redeemable qualities in it and I've found them. I really like Marius De Vries musical score and I like some of the scene transitions through the snow globes, and there are few raw acting moments between McGregor and Judd (like in the cafe or when he puts a charm in her hand as she is sleeping). But that's it. The story...is there a story? Is about a surveilance expert who becomes obsessed with a serial murderer after seeing her kill someone. He feels a connection to her because he lost his wife and daughter because he's too into the isolationism of high tech equipment and Judd's character was abandoned by her father. What follows is just plain imagery not connected by logic, story, or character development. What makes it even more annoying is that director Stephan Elliott thinks he made an awesome film. NO! Maybe on a technical level it's kind of cool because the editing and use of CGI was kind of neat to look at. The costuming was neat to look at, but I keep feeling like I missed something. I think the overall error in this movie is that this should have never been a movie. Eye of the Beholder was a book and should have stayed in a book. I believe that the book can make more sense out of the pretension in this movie.

This story is about a young, Dutch landscaper, Meneer Chrome (Ewan McGregor), who plans to create an extravagant garden for Thomas Smithers and his wife (Pete Postlethwaite and Greta Scacchi). His real plan or the real motive of this garden is to bankrupt Smithers so the not-so nice Fitzmaurice (Richard E. Grant) can seduce Smithers's wife. But Chrome begins having second thoughts about completing the plan after he becomes fascinated by Smithers's daughter Thea (Carmen Chaplin). I think people who have criticized this movie are far too harsh. I found it to have an excellent story with a talented cast. The performance that I felt most touched by was Carmen Chaplin's. Her struggle to find disorder in a world that wants to have order is an interesting element to the story. What I didn't like was the movie's pacing. I felt the message the movie was conveying that you can not control nature. I think this theme would have been better expressed in a short story or a short movie, not a feature length film. A part from that, I can sit through the hour and fifty minutes and feel glad that I saw this movie.