MovieChat Forums > A Clockwork Orange (1972) Discussion > An interesting difference in the book

An interesting difference in the book

posted 9 years ago by jtkreis-148-306662
10 replies | jump to latest

I just re-read the book and there is an interesting difference I noticed.

In the movie, after Alex gets out of prison and gets beat up by the cops (which the book makes clear is Dim and Billy Boy, not Dim and Georgie as people think) he stumbles to Mr. Alexander's house. At first, Mr. Alexander only knows Alex is the kid who was in the news but doesn't realize Alex was one of the people who attacked him two years earlier. At this point, Mr. A wants to help Alex. Then he realizes who Alex is and turns on him, ultimately trying to get him to kill himself. In the movie, we can only assume that he is trying to get Alex to kill himself for revenge for what Alex did to him and his wife a few years earlier.

But in the book, it is different. Alex stumbles to Mr. Alexander's house the same stuff happens except Mr. A doesn't realize that Alex had attacked him until they had already set up the plan to get him to kill himself. They are doing that (in the book) because they are political activists who want to over thrown the current ruling party. They know that if the Ludivico Treatment turns out to be a failure, it will look bad for the ruling party.

So in the book, it is actually irrelevant that Mr. Alexander realizes that Alex was one of the people who attacked him and his wife. I like that the movie was able to fix that because it seems weird from a storytelling perspective that it didn't really affect anything that Alex had had the previous encounter with Mr. Alexander and his wife.

[–] spaceman88 9 years ago

I just came here after watching the movie for the first time (I know, I know...).

Mr. Alexander makes the phone call to his politic allies shortly before hearing Alex sing in the bath tub, before he realises who he is.

I haven't read the book, but the final third of the movie clearly transforms the main character into a political pawn. I had different expectations from this movie. It turned out to share the same "dna" as "Network", in my oppinion. I loved it.

[–] jtkreis-148-306662 9 years ago

That's right: Mr. A did call his friends before he realized Alex was the one who had attacked him and his wife. So even in the movie, they must have been planning on driving him to suicide.

It's weird that they would make it irrelevant that Alex and Mr. A had had the previous run in.

[–] spaceman88 9 years ago

The plan to drive him to suicide might have happened after him realising who Alex was, though. The innitial plan might have been less... extreme.

[–] jtkreis-148-306662 9 years ago

I think they were going to drive him to suicide no matter what for two reasons:

1) In the book, it is clear they were going to drive him to suicide so it would look e current ruling party look bad. Mr. A's friends didn't seem to care, or necessarily believe, that Alex had been with the people who attacked MR. + Mrs. A.

2) What else could there plan have been to do to Alex? They wanted to make it look like the Ludivico treatment had failed. So what else could they have done?

[–] spaceman88 9 years ago

I believe they could have used him as a trophy and a puppet to display and manipulate through the media, very much like Alex ends up being to the goverment, at the end.

[–] jtkreis-148-306662 9 years ago

But what could they (Mr. Alexander's side) do with Alex to help them politically, other than getting him to kill himself?

[–] spaceman88 9 years ago

Propaganda. Statements about mistreatment, and how evil the system is.

[–] jtkreis-148-306662 9 years ago

How could that work? The ruling party seemed to be pretty upfront about what they did to Alex. They were clearly proud of the fact that they were more concerned with getting results than the prisoner's well-being. And, Mr. A's guys would basically have to kidnap Alex to keep control of him as I am sure Alex is suppose to report back for some sort of parole.

The main thing that makes me think they had the suicide planned from the beginning (before Mr. A figured out who Alex was) is that it was clearly that way in the book (Mr. A's three friends don't believe, or don't care, that Alex was with the group who attacked the As). So they would have had to change that part for the movie.

[–] karmapolice33 9 years ago

I think we are forgetting one of the greatest improvised scenes of all time when he decided to sing Singing in the Rain. That scene changed everything and I think Kubrick wanted to continue on with the Singing in the Rain reference and have the wheelchair guy find out that way. Maybe the original plan was to just have get Alex to just kill himself originally but Singing in the Rain changed everything. I'm glad they brought it back later in the movie while he was in the tub singing it.

[–] cartesianthought 9 years ago

Mr. Alexander's decision, in the movie, was still politically motivated.

If Alex had successfully committed suicide, it would have been used against the ruling party that the treatment resulted in his death whereas he may have been alive if he had remained in jail.