And viddy films I would

A Clockwork Orange

(1971)

What happened was, I wasn't finished roasting potatoes, and not having decided on a movie to watch, but not wanting to start one only to have to interrupt it a few minutes in, I decided to begin with salad and a screening of Don Hertzfeldt's wonderfully weird short Rejected. Naturally, once I heard the old Ludwig van on that soundtrack, I was ready for a bit of the old ultraviolent as well.

Among the many brilliances of Kubrick's film is its success in having its didactic cake and dining on some of the illicit thrills of which Alex must ultimately be cured of being cured. The almost (and I'm frankly not sure about the "almost") pornographic treatment of the red, red vino and the in-out, in-out seem calculated to deprive us of the opportunity to credit any good intentions to the repressive conditioning Alex undergoes. The Alex of act 2 is a victim--deprived of his pornographic pleasures even as the moral guardians of the state revel in them--and so the Alex of acts 1 and 3 is a hero whether we like it or not.