Rest assured I'm not walking around this provincial Welsh town in a bowler hat and false eyelashes brandishing a cane and threatening tramps with a tolchock on the gulliver.But I've long been a fan of A Clockwork Orange.
Trying to see the movie in the 80's and early 90's was, of course, quite difficult. My VHS copy had Dutch subtitles.
Kubrick's film is full of what is now considered classic retro imagery:
Burgess, writing in 1961, had envisaged the book as being set in 1972, but introduced the highly stylized speech and fashions as a means of 'futureproofing' ; Kubrick envisaged the story taking place at the end of the 20th century, but did not seek to create a vision of the future as he had done in 2001. The images that Kubrick and production designer John Barry created were
stylized visions of the then present, drawing on the Pop and Op art influenced interior design and architecture of the day.
The dystopia of Alex's high rise estate actually was just that; the movie is a depiction of Wandsworth , Borehamwood, Thamesmead and Hertfordshire in 1971.
What I hoped for, having seen 2001: A Space Odyssey, was an expert attempt at visual futurism. A Clockwork Orange, the book, had been set in a vague future which was probably already past; Kubrick had the opportunity to create a fantastic new future which, being realised in décor, could influence the present.
Anthony Burgess You've Had Your Time (1990)
Anyway, here's the original soundtrack from the movie:
You've gotta wonder what happened to our sense of colour during the '70s'.
ReplyDeletePotential nightmare for a Goth, eh H?
ReplyDeleteKubrick future-proofed the film by setting it in the 'present'. Compare and contrast with Metropolis or Forbidden Planet or...
ReplyDeleteMike
Mike- apparently the present day setting was governed by the budget. Hardly any sets were built, and 'real' locations used.
ReplyDeleteTrue, but that may also have been due to Kubricks wish to use what were clearly real settings rather than built sets, you can always tell, and his use of hand held cameras, often with Kubrick himself acting as cameraman. Still, I think that using 'contemporary' settings has stopped it aging as much as many other films. It also concentrates the viewer on the story rather than all the flim flam of the future. And nip down to Smiths and have a look in 'Wallpaper' - that's what the present day looks like in Hoxton...
ReplyDeleteMike