The Films of Stanley Kubrick: Conclusion and Ranking

After spending the last month watching every film Stanley Kubrick ever directed, I am now convinced that he may just be the best director in cinema history. Martin Scorsese will always be my favorite director – he’s the one whose films I return to the most often and who mean the most to be personally, but Kubrick made such brilliant films – films that you can revisit time and again, and continue to discover new things about. Scorsese himself said in A Life in Pictures that while Kubrick didn’t make a lot of films, his films are different each time you watch them – and that is very true. His technical abilities are unmatched – he changed the visual language of film more than any director since Orson Welles or D.W. Griffth. The films are endlessly fascinating, endlessly transfixing, and quite simply brilliant.

Below are how I would personally rank his 16 films – 3 shorts, and 13 features – made over the span of 46 years. I wish there were more films in this resume – but the price we pay for the brilliance of Kubrick was that he had to take the time he did to make them.

16. The Seafarers (1953) – Far and away the least interesting film Kubrick directed – basically a half hour infomercial for The Seafarers Union – which Kubrick clearly made to pay the bills. Nothing wrong with that, but there really is no reason to watch it unless you’re a Kubrick completest.

15. Flying Padre (1951) – Like The Seafarers, a short film made to pay the bills. Supposedly a documentary about a Priest who has to fly to see his spread out congregation, but the film is clearly heavily staged. Really not of much  interest.

14. Fear and Desire (1953) – Kubrick withdrew his feature debut from circulation – and would have been happy for it never to see the light of day. When a copy was discovered, and restored, the world could see why Kubrick didn’t like it. There are isolated moments that work amazingly well – but the dialogue and acting is basically horrible. I’m glad we can see it now – but I doubt I’ll ever watch it again.

13. Day of the Fight (1951) – The one short of Kubrick’s career that is worth seeing – the first one Kubrick made, based on his photo spread for Look Magazine. There are moments that show Kubrick’s genius in its gestation period, which make it worthwhile. Not a great short by any means – but the only short that feels like a personal project for Kubrick.

12. Killer’s Kiss (1955) – Like Fear & Desire, Killer’s Kiss is at its best when the characters are not talking, and Kubrick is showing his early understanding of shadow and light, and staging some interesting action sequences – including the creepy finale in a mannequin factory. What makes it far better than Fear & Desire is that there is far less talk – and Kubrick is more confident as a story teller. It would most likely be a completely forgotten noir, had Kubrick not gone on to do what he did later.

11. Spartacus (1960) – Of the 11 films Kubrick made after going to Hollywood, instead of doing independent productions like the previous 5, Spartacus is the one that feels less like a Kubrick film. It is a very well-staged Roman Epic – with some great battle sequences, and fine performances by all – but it is basically Kubrick as a director-for-hire – executing someone else’s vision rather than his own. As far as these type of epics of the time go – it’s actually quite good – better than most not directed by David Lean. But it’s also a film that I never really think about – and probably would have watched once and forgotten had it not be a Kubrick film.

10. Full Metal Jacket (1987) – If the whole film was as good as the first 45 minutes, than this film would be much higher on the list. But despite how brilliantly shot the final 70 minutes of the film is, it really doesn’t add anything new to the Vietnam war film, or war films in general, or even the brilliant opening segment during basic training. Be honest – the first two performances and characters you think of when you think of the film are Vincent D’Onofrio and R. Lee Ermey. There’s a reason for that. But half a Kubrick master is still worth celebrating.

9. The Killing (1956) – A brilliantly staged, edited and shot heist film – about a man who is a meticulous planner, undone when others don’t quite follow his plan. As tightly constructed as any film of its sort, with great use of narration, and fine performances. This showed Kubrick had the goods to go onto bigger and better things – and is a brilliant little film in its own right.

8. Lolita (1962) - Kubrick’s Lolita isn’t Nabokov’s Lolita – and it’s hardly even Kubrick’s, since he admitted that if he knew the censorship that would be involved, he probably wouldn’t have made it. But it’s still a fascinating, dark comedy about sexual obsession, brilliantly directed and written – with a quartet of great performances by James Mason as the pathetic Humbert, Shelley Winters as the brash, ignorant woman he marries, Peter Sellers as the libertine Clare Quilty, and yes, Sue Lyon, who keeps Lolita an enigma. Is the film more interesting to write about and discuss than it is to watch – to a certain degree. But it’s still a great film.

7. Paths of Glory (1957) – One of the best anti-war films ever made – Kubrick’s first masterpiece, than for most directors would be the highlight of their career. The film looks at the corrupt class system of war, the senseless cruelty and violence, and that final scene will bring a tear to the eye of anyone with a heart. Brilliantly directed – especially in the trenches.

6. A Clockwork Orange (1971) – The film that I downgraded the most upon the most recent review – perhaps because it is a young man’s film, and I’m not as young as I once was. I know find that I admire the film more than I actually love it – it is among the best shot, edited, score, acted and designed films of Kubrick’s career – and its message is as timely now as it was when it was released. A masterpiece – even if I liked it a little less than I did as a teenager.

5. Barry Lyndon (1975) – The film that I upgraded the most after the most recent re-watching – one of the most beautiful films ever made, as Kubrick found a way to make the 18^th Century look on film as it did in the paintings of the period. A story of a passive man, trying desperately to be something he cannot be – and be destroyed as a result. To some, it will be boring – but who cares about them?

4. Eyes Wide Shut (1999) – The more I watch the film, the more mysterious, ambiguous and brilliant Kubrick’s film seems to be. If A Clockwork Orange moved down the list a couple of places because it’s a young man’s film, than Eyes Wide Shut moved up a few spots because it’s the film I relate to most right now in my life. Objective? No – but I don’t really care.

3. The Shining (1980) – After the most recent re-watching, I am now more convinced than ever that The Shining is the best horror film ever made – and every bit as good as the top two films on this list. An endlessly fascinating enigma, puzzle box of a movie, with no real solution that is also brilliantly shot, editing, scored – and never ceases to scare the crap out of me.

2. Dr. Strangelove (1964) – For my money, the best comedy of the sound era – a movie that is simultaneously hilarious throughout, in large part because of the great performances by Peter Sellers, in three roles, George C. Scott, going over the top insane, and Sterling Hayden, doing understated insane, and downright frightening because of its implications of how close we could come to annihilation because of the idiots who are in charge. Scary, hilarious brilliantly directed. Not what we normally think of in a Kubrick film – but every bit as good as anything he has ever made.

1. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) – There are a handful of films that can be said to have truly changed cinema history – and 2001 is certainly one of those films. One of the most ambitious films ever made – that wants to do nothing less but to tell the history of humanity, and our place in the larger universe – and how the greatest thing about humanity is our intelligence. Brilliant as sci-fi, brilliant just as a visual experience, but also quietly profound, this is clearly one of the very best films ever made.

The Films of Stanley Kubrick (Offshoot): A.I.: Artificial Intelligence (2001)

A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)
Directed by: Steven Spielberg.
Written by: Steven Spielberg and Ian Watson based on the short story by Brian Aldiss.
Starring: Haley Joel Osment (David), Frances O'Connor (Monica Swinton), Sam Robards (Henry Swinton), Jake Thomas (Martin Swinton), Jude Law (Gigolo Joe), William Hurt (Prof. Hobby), Brendan Gleeson (Lord Johnson-Johnson), Robin Williams (Dr. Know), Ben Kingsley (Specialist), Meryl Streep (Blue Mecha), Chris Rock (Comedian).

Since I am writing this review as part of Stanley Kubrick retrospective, I should mention off the top that Steven Spielberg’s A.I. is not Stanley Kubrick’s A.I. I don’t know what Kubrick would have made of the material had he ended up making the film – which as A Life in Pictures implies, he did intend to do after making Eyes Wide Shut – as he wanted to let Special Effects catch up with his vision for the film. But that same documentary has Spielberg say that Kubrick had approached him before he died about directing the film – that Kubrick felt it more matched Spielberg’s sensibility than his own. Judging on what ended up on screen – Kubrick was right. Yet, I have no doubt that Kubrick could have made his version of A.I. as well – and it could also have been great. Spielberg is a great director in his own right however – and smart enough to know that if he was going to take over a project from Kubrick, that he would be stupid to try and do it the way Kubrick would have done it – so he made the film his own. It is undeniably the most Kubrickian film of Spielberg’s career – we see some thematic and stylistic hallmarks of Kubrick throughout – but it is still every inch a Spielberg film. And, for that matter, it’s one of Spielberg’s very best films.

The film opens with Hobby (William Hurt), sometime in the future, explaining the current state of Artificial Intelligence. Humans have created “Mechas” that look, feel and sound like human beings. They can also learn from past behavior, and imitate human emotions – but that is the key, they imitate human emotions, they do not feel them. Hobby wants to create a Mecha that can actually feel love. A member of the audience asks what is one of the key questions of the movie – if human beings can create something that feels genuine emotions – or is at least programmed to believe they feel them – what responsibility do humans have to that creation

Next we meet Monica and Henry Swinton (Frances O’Connor and Sam Robards), a married couple with a child of their own, but one with an illness that cannot be cured, so is being held in a sort of hibernation until he can be cured. One day, Henry brings home David (Haley Joel Osment) – a test mecha, the first to be made as a child, and one who will behave like one – and if Monica chooses to, will imprint on her – so that he will love her exclusively – so much so that if they ever choose to get rid of David, he has to go back to the factory to be destroyed. She is hesitant at first – but then grows to love David, and imprints him. And then her real child recovers – causing conflict between David and her real child.

The movie has a definite three act structure – with the first being David’s introduction to the Swinton’s, and what happens as a result. The second act is what happens after Monica decides she can no longer keep David – but cannot bring herself to have him destroyed, so she basically lets him off in the middle of the forest to be free. David knows the story of Pinocchio, and has convinced himself that if he can find the Blue Fairy – and become a real boy – that he can go back home to Mommy again. He meets up with Gigolo Joe (Jude Law) – a “lover mecha” who is on the run from the law himself, and the two journey to try and find the Blue Fairy for David. There are two brilliant set pieces in this part of the movie – a so called Flesh Fair, where people gather to destroy Mechas, and the second is Rogue City – a kind of Las Vegas wonderland, which is perhaps the best single environment created in a Spielberg film to date. The third act, set 2,000 later, takes a very strange turn indeed – into an area that few filmmakers would even attempt.

The film is, undeniably, more sentimental than any film Stanley Kubrick ever made. Yet, it is not overly sentimental to me – it is that rare film that appeals equally to the emotions and the brains. Haley Joel Osment's performance is key in this – he creates David as a child who is real enough to be loved, but is still somewhat mechanical – there is something missing about him. This would be a hard performance for any actor – but for a child, it is simply remarkable. Jude Law gives one of his very best performances as Gigolo Joe as well – even more mechanical than David, one who doesn’t feel genuine emotion at all – just knows what his programming is.

But that also describes David too, doesn’t it? He never really feels any genuine emotions – he simply follows his programming, which requires him to feel emotions – or more accurately to think he feels emotions. But what is the difference between genuinely feeling somewhat, and just thinking you feel something. Is What Monica does to him kind – because she allows him to live, or cruel because David will never be able to love anyone other than Monica – so he will never be able to recover, the way a real person would.

As a technical achievement, A.I. is truly remarkable. It is a brilliantly directed film by Spielberg – who uses some Kubrickian tracking shots, and zooms, but generally stays away from Kubrick’s hallmarks visually. He creates a wonderful visual world – one enhanced by John Williams score. Even if you find the story lacking – and some do – I do not know how one could not love the visual world Spielberg has created here.

One thing that has always mystified me is the feeling that Spielberg somehow copped out at the end – and gave the film an underserved happy ending. This is a film that ends with all of humanity being wiped out, with the main character staying put, praying to an inanimate object for 2,000 years in vain to become a real boy, who is brought back – by advanced mechas (yes, they are mechas, and yes, Spielberg probably would have been wise to not make them look so much like a Spielberg alien) because they now do not have any memory of humanity – and David has those memories. They then get those memories from David – watch him operate his programming as it was meant to (by bringing back his mother, either in real life, or simple programming language) – and then basically let David expire – they do not need him anymore. I know the final scene – which gives David what he wants – is meant, at least in part, to draw tears from the audience (and succeeds in many cases) – but that doesn’t mean the end of A.I. is happy – it’s actually rather hard to think of a bleaker ending. It is certainly bleaker than the end of Kubrick’s 2001 – a film who Spielberg takes a few hints from in the ending here.

To bring it back to the beginning, Steven Spielberg did not make the film Stanley Kubrick could or would have made if he had lived long enough to make this film. He did something different – not necessarily better or worse (we will never know that) – but undeniably his own. There is apparently a movie going to be made at some point based on Kubrick’s Napoleon screenplay – another movie he never got to make. I am trying to reserve judgment – but this strikes me as a bad idea. There was only on Stanley Kubrick – no one else can be Stanley Kubrick. Steven Spielberg knew this, so when he took over a project from Kubrick – he made it is his own – and he made a masterpiece. It’s not Kubrick – but it is brilliant.

The Films of Stanley Kubrick (Offshoot): Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures (2001)

Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures (2001)
Directed by: Jan Harlan.
Featuring: Tom Cruise, Ken Adam, Margaret Adams, Brian Aldiss, Woody Allen, Steven Berkoff, Louis C. Blau, John Calley, Milena Canonero, Wendy Carlos, Arthur C. Clarke, Alex Cox, Allen Daviau, Ed Di Giulio, Keir Dullea, Shelley Duvall, Anthony Frewin, James B. Harris, Michael Herr, Mike Herrtage, Philip Hobbs, Irene Kane, Nicole Kidman, Barbara Kroner, Anya Kubrick, Christiane Kubrick, Katharina Kubrick, Paul Lashmar, György Ligeti, Steven Marcus, Paul Mazursky, Malcolm McDowell, Douglas Milsome, Matthew Modine, Jack Nicholson, Tony Palmer, Alan Parker, Sydney Pollack, Richard Schickel, Martin Scorsese, Terry Semel, Alexander Singer, Steven Spielberg, Sybil Taylor, Douglas Trumbull, Peter Ustinov, Marie Windsor, Alan Yentob, Jan Harlan, Leon Vitali.

I have owned a copy of Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures for a decade now – ever since I bought the Stanley Kubrick collection on DVD that included 2001, A Clockwork Orange, Full Metal Jacket and Eyes Wide Shit – but I have never watched it. I love Kubrick – of course – but I wasn’t sure if I needed to see a documentary directed by Jan Harlan – one of his closest friends and collaborators, which no doubt would simply be a glowing portrait of the man. Having seen the film now, that is pretty much how I would describe the movie – glowing. It interviews Kubrick’s family, a few friends, his collaborators, and there is hardly a negative word spoken about the man. It skims his early years, and doesn’t delve into his personal life too much, but instead focuses on the movies he made. This is fascinating in many respects – interviews with many of the actors who worked with him, and other collaborators, provide some insight into his process. Interviews with filmmakers like Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, Woody Allen and Alex Cox provide insight into why directors love his films so much. Interviews with his family give limited insight into his life. It is all very interesting, but I think the documentary never really goes very deep into any of Kubrick’s work, or his life. It almost plays like a primer for people who know little or nothing about the man.

The film starts with Kubrick as a child – but doesn’t really dwell on that. A brief interview with his sister, and a few friends, and then we’re off to his career. About 15 minutes into the film and we’re already at 1956’s The Killing – having covered his childhood, his photographic work for Look Magazine, his three shorts, and first two films – Fear & Desire and Killer’s Kiss – in that time. From there, the movie takes its structure from Kubrick’s films – going chronologically from The Killing to Eyes Wide Shut, with stops along the way for each of his films.

The movie does provide some insight into how Kubrick worked, and how each of the films were received. There, a pattern emerges, with each film from Lolita to Eyes Wide Shut receiving tremendously mixed reviews and controversy, which over the years gives way to the consensus that the films are masterpieces. Obviously, many of Kubrick’s early collaborators are no longer around, so there are fewer interviews with the people who worked on the earlier films. Oddly, though, the film doesn’t have interviews with many of Kubrick’s collaborators who were still around when the film was made. There is no interview with Kirk Douglas – who Kubrick made two films with, clashing with on Spartacus – or Shelley Winters who worked on Lolita or Ryan O’Neal, who did Barry Lyndon nor any of the actors who worked on Full Metal Jacket except for Matthew Modine. We know that Kubrick could be difficult on set – and drove some of his actors crazy – but other than Shelley Duvall – who mostly acts like a good sport about what she went through on The Shining – no one has a bad word to say about the man.

In many ways, it feels like the film is pulling its punches. One of the most fascinating moments for me was Kubrick’s daughter reading one of his detailed instructions on how to separate two cats from fighting when he went away from a while – it is ridiculously detailed, and shows more than a little bit of obsessive compulsion disorder. A stronger film could delve into some of the darker aspects of Kubrick’s personality, and the way he worked, and still conclude that Kubrick was a genius – which is what he was. If he had to put people – himself included – to get what he needed, than that is what he had to do.

The film is still good – and of interest to Kubrick fans. But I was somewhat disappointed that the film didn’t delve into Kubrick a little deeper – not the man, who valued his privacy – but his films themselves. It seems like a missed opportunity that the film only has one interview with a film critic – Richard Schnickel – when it could have used much more (like Roger Ebert). Instead, the film is clearly made by a man who loved Kubrick – both as a person, and a filmmaker – and wants everyone else to love him too. There is value in that – but its limited, and it limits how good this film is.

The Films of Stanley Kubrick: Eyes Wide Shut (1999)

Eyes Wide Shut (1999)
Directed by: Stanley Kubrick.
Written by: Stanley Kubrick and Frederic Raphael inspired by the novel by Arthur Schnitzler.
Starring: Tom Cruise (Dr. William Harford), Nicole Kidman (Alice Harford), Sydney Pollack (Victor Ziegler), Marie Richardson (Marion), Rade Serbedzija (Milich), Todd Field (Nick Nightingale), Vinessa Shaw (Domino), Sky du Mont (Sandor Szavost), Fay Masterson (Sally), Leelee Sobieski (Milich's Daughter), Thomas Gibson (Carl), Madison Eginton (Helena Harford), Julienne Davis (Mandy), Gary Goba (Naval Officer), Alan Cumming (Desk Clerk), Leon Vitali (Red Cloak).

Eyes Wide Shut is the only Kubrick film I was old enough to see – and really to be aware of – when it first came out. Of course, Kubrick died shortly after finishing the film, which only fed the anticipation of the movie. There were all sorts of crazy rumors surrounding the film – by the lead press you would almost assume that Kubrick had pretty much made a porno with perhaps the most famous couple in Hollywood at the time – Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. Then people actually saw the film – and I think the reaction was more confusion than anything else. Some of the reviews were great – some were horrible – but I think many people didn’t quite know what to make the film on the first viewing. As the documentary Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures (which I will review next) makes clear, this was pretty much par for the course for a Kubrick film – pretty much everyone since Lolita had the same reaction, before slowly the opinion on the film started to evolve over the years – most being considered masterpieces many. I’m not sure Eyes Wide Shut has quite undergone that transformation among many as of yet – but I do not doubt that eventually it will get there. I saw the film three, perhaps four times in theaters – and quite a few times on VHS and DVD over the next few years – but it’s probably been six or seven years since I had a look at the film. I loved it each time I saw it – but I’m not sure I could explain it at the time. This is a mysterious film in many ways – the Kubrick film it most reminds me of is, strangely, The Shining – as both films are rather ambiguous, could lead to multiple interpretations, and have parts that arguably take place only in the head of the main character. The film has a dreamlike quality to it – something I find myself admiring more and more in films as the years go by. Watching it this time – a little older, a little closer in terms of age to the main characters, and closer to the spot they are in life (married, kids) – I think I loved it even more this time than ever before. It truly is the final masterpiece of Kubrick’s career.

Bill Harford (Cruise) is a character who in some ways reminded me of Barry Lyndon – both men are passive in many ways, and have things happen to them. The difference is that Barry is a character who tries desperately to fit in – and destroys himself attempting to do something he cannot, and Bill is a man who when the film opens thinks he has everything figured out – the beautiful wife, the pretty young daughter, the thriving medical practice, the right friends – but is thrown for a loop when his wife, Alice (Kidman) tells him something that he didn’t imagine was possible. When we first meet them, they are preparing to go to a party held by Victor (Sydney Pollack) – a rich patient and friend of Bill’s. At the party, the pair separate – Kidman gets drunk and flirts with an older Hungarian man, leading him on a little bit, playing with him before she backs off. Bill flirts with two beautiful, younger models – before he’s called away to help Victor – who has trouble with a younger woman himself – one who has OD’ed in his bathroom.

It is these two flirtations – the one between Alice and the older man, and Bill and the models – who set the rest of the film in motion. Alice wants to talk about it – and Bill says something rather stupid things – about how men talk to beautiful women because they want to sleep with them, but sex is something different for women – it’s more about safety and security – commitment if you will. This is when Alice throws Bill for a loop – confessing a fantasy she had the previous year when she saw a Naval Officer at the hotel they were staying at – where she said that she was ready to throw everything away if only he had wanted her – even if it was only for one night. An argument ensures – but before it can really get going, Bill is called away – a patient of his has died, and he has to go to his apartment.

So Bill heads off into the New York night, with visions of his wife and the Naval Officer having sex (which they never did) in his head. It’s somewhere around here, that I think the movie starts to segue between fantasy and reality. It really happens after Bill arrives at the apartment of the dead man, and talks to his daughter – who he barely knows – in the same room as the body. At first, their conversation is rather mundane – the type of small talk you expect between two people who don’t know each other well, but are forced to exchange pleasantries for a few minutes. And then things take a change – when the woman, Marion (Marie Richardson) tells Bill about her fiancé Carl (Thomas Gibson) – and then breaks down in tears, telling Bill she cannot marry Carl, and move to Michigan – because she is in love with Bill – and even if they cannot be together, she needs to be near him.

This conversation doesn’t make a lot of sense. Would this really be the time Marion would confess her love to Bill – with the body of dead father in the same room? But what I noticed this time through, which had not registered before, is that Marion looks a little like Kidman – she wears her hair in much the same way. (For that matter, Carl, when we meet him later in that scene, is almost a clone of Bill – same haircut, same manner). What Marion says is much like what Alice had said about the naval officer – that she would ruin her life for one night with him.

Marion is the first, but is hardly the last, person who will respond to Cruise sexually almost immediately. From that point on, pretty much every interaction Cruise has for the rest of the night is sexual. The frat boys who he meets on the street, and accuse him of being a “fag”, the prostitute Domino (Vinessa Shaw), who he meets, and goes to her apartment – although nothing happens, and their interaction is much more tender, almost sweet, than we expect. The costume shop he visits – where the look the daughter (Leelee Sobieski) gives him is reminiscent of Lolita. Eventually, Bill makes his way to a bar where his friend Nick (Todd Field) –who he met for the first time in years at Victor’s party – who tells him about the wild party he has been hired to play at later than night. It is this party – which Bill gets the details from Nick – which sets up the most infamous scene in the film.

Cruise arrives – wearing a costume, like Nick told him to – at a huge mansion out somewhere in the country. He is escorted in, and witnesses a strange ritual – everyone is wearing masks, but the women there are wearing pretty much only masks. A ritual takes place – a woman leaves the circle a picks up Bill – and immediately tells him he has to leave – he doesn’t belong there, and he will be found out. Bill doesn’t listen – and walks through the house during the orgy. We can now, finally, see the version Kubrick intended – unedited, and more graphic, but hardly pornographic. The version we saw in theaters in 1999 had objects or people digitally added to cover some of the more graphic thrusting (again, it is hardly graphic – but more graphic than the MPAA liked presumably). The sex we see is hardly erotic – it is mechanical and emotionless – made more so by the fact that everyone is wearing masks, so we cannot see any faces and Kubrick uses music to mask all the sounds of sex. Bill is, of course, found out – and thrown out, but only after the woman who picked him up agrees to sacrifice herself for him – and is warned not to tell anyone, anything about what he saw – and not to try and figure out anything about it.

This is about the first half – a little more, but not much – of the film. The rest of the film is Bill not taking the advice he was given when he was thrown out of the orgy, and trying to figure out what happened anyway – something made harder by the fact that Nick has disappeared, and the body of a woman, who he thinks may have been the one who saved her, was found in a hotel – dead of an apparent drug overdose.

The film operates more on dream logic than anything else. Some complained that Kubrick’s New York doesn’t resemble the real New York – the streets are different, too deserted – which is partly explained by the fact that Kubrick, of course, didn’t actually shoot the film in New York – but in London. To me, this is beside the point. This isn’t New York after all – but the New York in the dream world of the film. I’ve always thought that only part of the film actually happens, and part of it is only in the mind – or the dreams (which is the same thing, really) – of Bill. But Kubrick doesn’t do anything to let the audience know what is what – much like he did in The Shining. The film eventually does explain everything – as Victor gives Bill an explanation – but that seems a little too convenient – too pat, too neat. He gives the explanation the audience is looking for – but doesn’t necessarily wrap things up as neatly as most movies would.

What the film is ultimately about is commitment, fidelity and marriage. This is a movie about a married couple, one of whom thought he had a perfect marriage, the other who knew the truth – who still find a way, in the end, to stay together. To Kubrick, commitment and fidelity is a choice – and Bill’s journey is to see what else could be out there should he stray from his marriage. It is a scary world – and so he retreats back into the comfort of his marriage. In a way, he has become the typical “woman” he described to Alice earlier in the film.

The performances in the movie are excellent. Cruise has never been this passive in a movie before – he’s plays Bill as a man who is constantly in over his head, who is at the mercy of the other characters who are the ones who really drive the plot. He heads out into New York twice – once in the night, and once in the day, and the two are different, yet equally disturbing to him. Kidman, although her role is far smaller than Cruise’s – is even better. She really drives the plot – from her flirting, to her confrontation with Cruise where she admits her desires, to the final scene – which is brilliantly played by Kidman, with one of the best final lines (really, a word) in cinema history.

Eyes Wide Shut, like all of Kubrick’s best films is still in many ways a mystery to me. Kubrick’s intentions are always somewhat mysterious – and perhaps never more so than here. But each time I watch the film, the better I think it gets – the more insightful it is into the realities of marriage. Bill and Alice may not have a healthy marriage at the beginning – but they may well have one by the end. In many ways, Eyes Wide Shut is the most hopeful film of Kubrick’s career. By the end, Bill has finally realized what his marriage really is – and only then can he, and Alice, really move forward.

The Films of Stanley Kubrick: Full Metal Jacket (1987)

Full Metal Jacket (1987)
Directed by: Stanley Kubrick.
Written by: Stanley Kubrick & Michael Herr & Gustav Hasford based on the novel by Hasford.
Starring: Matthew Modine (Pvt. J.T. 'Joker' Davis), Adam Baldwin (Animal Mother), Vincent D'Onofrio (Pvt. Leonard 'Gomer Pyle' Lawrence), R. Lee Ermey (Gny. Sgt. Hartman), Dorian Harewood (Eightball), Kevyn Major Howard (Rafterman), Arliss Howard (Pvt. Cowboy), Ed O'Ross (Lt. Touchdown), John Terry (Lt. Lockhart), Kieron Jecchinis (Crazy Earl), Kirk Taylor (Payback).

The first 45 minutes of Full Metal Jacket is as good as anything Stanley Kubrick has ever made – which means it’s as good as just about any film you can name. The problem with the film is that it is 116 minutes long – and the final 70 minutes of the film is nowhere near as strong as those first 45 minutes. This isn’t to say that those final 70 minutes are bad – they aren’t, they are actually quite good. But they cannot help but pale in comparison to where the film started. Whenever I think of the film, I think of R. Lee Ermey's Drill Sergeant and Vincent D'Onofrio's Private Pyle – and little else. Although I’ve seen the film numerous times, the final 70 minutes always fairly quickly fade from my memory after the film is over – which is not something I can say about just about any other Kubrick film. Full Metal Jacket is half masterpiece, and half very good war film. Well, that’s still better than most films.

The first 45 minutes on the film take place on Paris Island, where the Marine Corps run their basic training. The film opens with a montage of the various recruits all getting identical buzz cuts – and the point of the film becomes clear in those few moments – the Marines do not want individuals, they want the same person over and over again. They want killing machines. The film then moves to Ermey's Drill Sergeant walking around the barracks and berating the new recruits, with colorful, often hilarious insults. He informs the new recruits that he will break them down and turn them into Marines, not the bags of shit they currently are. He gives many of the recruit’s catchy nicknames – Joker for the recruit (Matthew Modine) who does a John Wayne impression during that opening tirade, and Gomer Pyle for the recruit (D'Onofrio) who cannot stop himself from smiling at Ermey's insults. He is overweight, and out of shape, and the Drill Sergeant sets his sights on him right away – he will be singled out from the most punishment because he needs the most work.

There is a point about 30 minutes into the movie that represents a turning point for Pyle – after which, he`ll go from the somewhat sweet, dimwitted man into something far more disturbing. When he looks at the camera later in this segment, he looks much like Jack Nicholson in The Shining – and he talks not unlike HAL 9000 from 2001 – cold, methodical and emotionless. The film ends this segment in violence – showing how the Marine Corps did precisely what they wanted with Pyle – turn him into a killing machine.

The last 70 minutes follows Joker, who works for the magazine Stars and Stripes, through the Vietnam war. He is told by his superior that they are interested in only two stories – those about winning the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese, or about winning the war itself – two things the rest of the movie make clear are not actually happening. The film follows Joker as he goes to the front, and climaxes in an incredibly tense standoff with a Vietcong Sniper.

That first 45 minutes is brilliant – darkly hilarious, surreal, disturbing and extremely well-acted by Ermey and D'Onofrio. Throughout his career, Kubrick would return to the idea of the dehumanizing aspect of violence in general, and war in particular. This is his theme in Full Metal Jacket – and by the end of those opening 45 minutes, it has firmly established that in a brilliant way. Like Paths of Glory, Full Metal Jacket is an anti-war movie. We will see horrific acts of violence in Full Metal Jacket – but Kubrick sees this more as a product of the war, than the personal responsibility of the people in general. Like D'Onofrio by the end of that first segment, almost all of the grunts who have seen violence in the second part talk in cold, methodical ways – almost like machines, not like people. If the first half of the movie is about the gradual dehumanization of Pyle, the second half does something similar for Joker – it takes him longer to get there, but he still gets there.

The second half of the movie is brilliantly well made in many ways – it has some great Steadicam shots following the men on patrol, and disturbing scenes like when it shows a Marine in a helicopter shooting everyone below them, for no real reason. The final confrontation with the sniper is masterfully constructed, and incredibly intense.

And yet, it feels like something is lacking in that segment. This is supposed to be Vietnam, but was shot in England – because Kubrick lived there, and didn’t want to get on a boat or a plane. He shipped in palm trees to try and make England look more like Vietnam – but it doesn’t quite work. It all feels a little phoney and false – especially when compared to movies like Platoon (1986) or Apocalypse Now (1979) or The Deer Hunter (1978). And worse than that, it feels slightly unnecessary – I don’t think Kubrick adds much to his overall point that he hadn’t established, and better, in the first 45 minutes.

The biggest problem with that last 70 minutes of the film is not really anything in it – it is well acted, directed and written, even if does feel a little fake at times. The biggest problem is simply that is has the misfortune of following the brilliant 45 minutes that opened the film. That part is as good as anything you will see. The 70 minutes that follow is fine – but cannot help but be hurt by following something brilliant.

The Films of Stanley Kubrick (Offshoot): Room 237 (2012)

Room 237 (2012)
Directed by: Rodney Ascher.
Featuring: Bill Blakemore, Geoffrey Cocks, Juli Kearns, John Fell Ryan, Jay Weidner.

The five people who speak during Rodney Ascher's brilliant, hilarious documentary Room 237 are people who cannot see the forest for the trees. During the course of the film, they will give their various interpretations of Stanley Kubrick’s film The Shining – arguing that the film isn’t really about what it seems to be about. To one, it is about the Holocaust. To another, it’s about the Genocide of the Native Americans. To another, its Kubrick’s confession for faking the moon landing footage (he wants everyone to know that he does believe that Apollo 11 actually did land on the moon – it was just the footage that was faked – he isn’t crazy or anything). The other two aren’t nearly as clear about their interpretations – but they simply look very deeply, and make a lot out of what they think they have discovered in the film.

In a way, Room 237 is a film about film criticism – film critic’s job is to analyze films, of course, and to find the meaning of the film, and the subtext in them. But what the five people in Room 237 do is far beyond what film critics do. They barely even deal with the surface of the film – things like plot, or characters, or performances or music, or shot selection, or anything else that actually make up the whole of the film. To them, everything is The Shining is just a stand in for some larger meaning that Kubrick was trying to get viewers to notice. A missing chair is not a simple continuity error – but Kubrick playing with genre conventions to get the audience to look deeper. Similarly, a missing sticker of Dopey is not a continuity error – but a sign from Kubrick that Danny is no longer a dope. A German typewriter is a symbol of the Holocaust, because the Germans went about the elimination of the Jews in a bureaucratic way. A can of Calamut baking powder is a symbol of Native Americans – and when later in the film, more than one is behind Nicholson’s head, in a disorganized way, that’s a symbol of broken treaties with the Native Americans. Kubrick changed the room number from Stephen Kings novel not because the hotel it was based on requested it (like Kubrick said) but because the moon is 237,000 miles from earth. And perhaps my favorite, one dissolve near the end of the film momentarily gives Nicholson a Hitler mustache.

The argument that all of them make at one point or another is that since we all know Stanley Kubrick was a perfectionist, than everything in the film had to be put there on purpose – and all of it must mean something. But continuity errors happen on nearly every film – even on those made by perfectionists. And when someone points out that during the infamous Steadicam shots of Danny on his big wheel, that you can see, in the corners, parts of rooms that shouldn’t be there, that is most likely just the reality of shooting on a set, and not a real location.

There is also a lot of seeing only what the viewers want to see to further their point in the film. Is it a coincidence that the man who specializes in German history, particularly Nazi history, sees the film as about the Holocaust? Or that the man who admits he was thinking a lot about genocide and the Native Americans see The Shining as about that. Or the man, who was already convinced Kubrick faked the moon landing, sees this as his confession. All of them take only what they want in the movie, and discard the rest.

None of this is to say that there are not deeper meanings in The Shining – or in any film for that matter. Often, directors have used genre films to comment on something larger than the surface level of the plot. But the amount of detail that these people look at in The Shining crosses the line between deep analysis into the pathological and insane. The connections they make are only in their mind – and not in the film itself.

None of this means that Room 237 isn’t a great film – it is a great film. But it’s not great in the way the five subjects of the film would probably want it to be. They didn’t succeed in convincing me of anything during the course of the movie other than the fact that they are somewhat insane. Room 237 is, in many ways, about the danger of looking too closely – so closely that you no longer even see the object you are looking at, and instead see things that are not there. And it’s also about the culture we live in today – where ambiguity is something to be questioned, where art is a puzzle simply to be solved. Not every movie is like The Usual Suspects or The Sixth Sense – where there is a moment where everything snaps into place. Sometimes, there are no answers. But there are people who do not want to see things that way – they want David Chase to tell them explicitly if Tony Soprano is alive or dead at the end of the show. They want David Lynch to explain all the mysteries of Twin Peaks or Eraserhead or Mulholland Drive.

The film is also incredibly entertaining – and at times downright hilarious. Ascher never interjects in the film, but instead just allows his subjects to talk and talk, while showing us in detail the scenes from the movie they are talking about. Sometimes, you definitely notice that what they are saying is correct – not their interpretation per se, but what is actually on screen. And sometimes, what they are saying are simply not there – no matter how closely Ascher looks for it.

The film is wonderful – and Ascher definitely picked the right film to make this documentary about. He could have done it with any number of films, but The Shining is one of those films that simply defies expectations – and contains questions that simply have no answers – at least not in the film itself. Kubrick did this intentionally – he wanted there to be different interpretations of his film. But I cannot help but think that he may well view these five as crazy as I did. Sometimes a missing chair is just a missing chair.

The Films of Stanley Kubrick: The Shining (1980)

The Shining (1980)
Directed by: Stanley Kubrick.
Written by: Stanley Kubrick & Diane Johnson based on the novel by Stephen King.
Starring: Jack Nicholson (Jack Torrance), Shelley Duvall (Wendy Torrance), Danny Lloyd (Danny Torrance), Scatman Crothers (Dick Hallorann), Barry Nelson (Stuart Ullman), Philip Stone (Delbert Grady), Joe Turkel (Lloyd the Bartender), Anne Jackson (Doctor), Tony Burton (Larry Durkin), Lia Beldam (Young Woman in Bath), Billie Gibson (Old Woman in Bath), Barry Dennen (Bill Watson).

Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining is an easy movie to get lost in (I do a review of the great documentary Room 237 next, about five such people) as the film contains so many traps and misdirections that every time you watch it, the film seems to change and become something different. I am not sure how many times I’ve seen the film – yet every time I watch it, it seems like a completely different film from the one that I had in my mind. It is a film that defies easy interpretation – and every time I think I have it figured out, it slips through my fingers again. I do not see this as a flaw in the film – but one of its greatest strengths. The film may confuse, confound and infuriate those who want to be taken by the hand by the filmmaker and walked through the film – but for those of us who love ambiguity in our films, The Shining is one of the greatest ever made. It’s interesting that Kubrick made this film following Barry Lyndon – that film makes us watch it precisely the way Kubrick wants us to, and see things precisely the way he does. The Shining is almost the complete opposite.

The story is well known to all – Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) takes a job as the winter caretaker for the historic Overlook Hotel, in the mountains of Colorado, where from November until May he’ll be cut off from the rest of the world. He brings along his wife Wendy (Shelley Duvall) and their young son Danny (Danny Lloyd) – who has the “shine”, basically physic powers. At some point during the winter, Jack starts to go insane, and will eventually try and murder his family.

That is about all I can say with absolute certainty about the film. There are ghosts in the film – or perhaps not. Danny has visions about the violence in the hotel’s past – but can we trust those visions? Torrance talks to various ghosts – like Lloyd the Bartender, and Grady, the former caretaker who murdered his family – but are they really there, or are they simply a product of his insanity? Or does Danny plant those visions? When Torrance goes into Room 237, and has a vision of a beautiful, young woman in the bathtub – who he starts making out with, only to have her change into the rotting corpse of an older woman, what exactly does that mean? Does that happen – are the women ghosts – or is it in his mind? Or, is this just one of Danny’s visions – as Kubrick cuts back and forth between Jack in that room, and Danny transmitting the vision to Dick Halloran (Scatman Crothers), the hotel’s friendly chef, in an attempt to get him to come back to the hotel and save him and his mother. Is Danny just making it up – Jack certainly doesn’t share this vision with Wendy in the scene right after it, nor does he even seem upset, although during that scene in that room he is horrified. Jack has already started going insane before we see him interacting with any of the “ghosts” in the hotel – he has already embarked on his “writing project”, has already snapped at Wendy for interrupting him, already had his disturbing meeting with Danny, where Danny asks if Jack would ever hurt them, and comes away far from reassured, and we have already seen him staring, with a disturbed look on his face, at his family. Has Kubrick, an atheist, really made a ghost story – which would imply there is an afterlife, or has he made a film about insanity – so that all the ghosts and visions are just in the minds of his characters? But then, if they are not ghosts who can manipulate reality, how does Jack get out of that room near the end of the movie. And what does that final shot in the movie mean. See what I mean – it’s easy to get lost down numerous rabbit holes while watching The Shining. And every time I watch the film, I get a different impression of what really is going on, and what it all means. The closer I look, the farther I get away from knowing the answers – probably because Kubrick has designed the film to have no definitive answers in the first place.

There are more questions in The Shining that go unanswered in the film – and I would argue are unanswerable given what is in the movie itself. This is by design. At nearly two and half hours, The Shining is one of the longest horror films ever made – most filmmakers limit their horror films to 90 minutes, because it’s nearly impossible to maintain the proper sense of terror for that long. But Kubrick does just that in The Shining – in part because of those unanswerable questions. Even in the somewhat normal opening scenes in the film, something is clearly not right with Jack, or the hotel. And the movie gradually ratchets up the tension throughout, until one of the best horror movie climaxes of all time – that even though I have seen the film countless times, never ceases to scare me half to death.

The film is a technical marvel from the start – with its opening, long helicopter shot under the opening credits. The most famous shots in the movie are undoubtedly the long Steadicam shots of Danny riding his big wheel around the hotel, and discovering things he probably shouldn’t. In a documentary on the DVD about the film, many imply that Kubrick did these shots simply because he could – they represented a technical challenge, and Kubrick never shied away from that. Perhaps that’s true – but like the rest of the film, these shots only heighten the terror in the movie.

Stephen King, who wrote the original novel, and hated Kubrick’s film, argued against Jack Nicholson because he would immediately seem unhinged, instead of gradually getting there. He was right in a way – there is something off about Nicholson from the start – but that is more keeping in line with Kubrick’s vision of the story than Kings. This is not Stephen Kings The Shining – as Kubrick took what he wanted from the novel, and threw the rest away, with many of the most iconic touches being his own, and not Kings. I understand why King would not be thrilled with a director doing that to a novel he felt was extremely personal – but that doesn’t mean the rest of us cannot be thrilled with what Kubrick did.

And Nicholson’s performance is wonderful throughout – one of the most disturbing, and altogether terrifying portraits of insanity every put on film. Nicholson, who is often accused of playing the same character every time out – the charming rogue, full of the same mannerisms – starts at that place in The Shining, and then goes further than he ever has before. Shelley Duvall, who apparently had a miserable time in the movie, and butted heads with Kubrick throughout, nevertheless gives a great performance as a terrified woman – bringing a mundane normalcy to her early scenes, and truly visceral terror near the end. Kubrick was hard on her – but he got what he needed.

The Shining is one of the greatest horror films ever made. It doesn’t rely on blood and guts, and doesn’t rely on the type of cheap scares that populate most horror movies. Kubrick doesn’t shoot it like a normal horror movie either – but favors deep focus, and wide shots, instead of simple darkness and close-ups. It is a master class is horror filmmaking – one that 34 years later has not really been matched.

The Films of Stanley Kubrick: Barry Lyndon (1975)

Barry Lyndon (1975)
Directed by: Stanley Kubrick.
Written by: Stanley Kubrick based on the novel by William Makepeace Thackeray.
Starring: Ryan O'Neal (Barry Lyndon), Marisa Berenson (Lady Honoria Lyndon), Patrick Magee (Chevalier de Balibari), Hardy Krüger (Captain Potzdorf), Steven Berkoff (Lord Ludd), Gay Hamilton (Nora Brady), Marie Kean (Barry's Mother), Diana Körner (Lischen), Murray Melvin (Reverend Samuel Runt), Frank Middlemass (Sir Charles Lyndon), André Morell (Lord Gustavus Adolphus Wendover), Arthur O'Sullivan (Captain Feeny, the Highwayman), Godfrey Quigley (Captain Grogan), Leonard Rossiter (Captain John Quin), Philip Stone (Graham), Leon Vitali (Lord Bullingdon), Michael Hordern (Narrator).

Stanley Kubrick has a reputation of cold detachment in his films – and while that is somewhat overstated in some cases, it is the perfect description for Barry Lyndon. Despite the fact that the film was nominated for seven Oscars – including three for Kubrick for Picture, Director and Screenplay, and winning four others – for Cinematography, Art Direction, Costume Design and Score Adaptation – the film was viewed by many in 1975 as a disappointment – it certainly has never connected with audiences, who find the film long and boring. But over the years, the film has grown in stature, as critics at least have caught up to what Kubrick was doing in the film. This is a cold film – and it tells, in detail – the story of an inconsequential life of Redmond Barry (Ryan O’Neil), who starts a poor Irish farmer, rises to the heights of British society, and loses it all again. Barry is a rather passive character, who in many ways stumbles through the events of his own life. Kubrick adapted the novel by William Makepeace Thackeray, who wrote his book as a satire, told in the first person to try and gain some sympathy for his lead character. Whatever Thackery was satirizing doesn’t come across in Kubrick’s film – and he replaces the first person narrator with a bemused, omnipotent narrator, who often tells us what is going to happen much later in the movie. The first half of the movie takes place mainly during the Seven Years War – but the movie makes no effort to explain what that war was fought for. The narrator tells us that someone more versed in history would have to explain it – because it doesn’t really matter to this story. Some countries are fighting with other countries, and Barry is caught up in it – first as a British soldier, but then he deserts, and is caught and forced into the Prussian Army – which was far worse, far more cruel and brutal than what Barry was running away from. Although the narrator – and Kubrick – never state it outright, perhaps what Barry went through in the war explains the man he would become. While some see Barry’s fall as a result of society’s moral failings – I’ve always seen it as a more personal failing on the part of Barry himself.

When the film opens, Redmond Barry is a fool in love with his cousin Nora (Gay Hamilton). She decides to marry a wealthy British officer, and so Barry challenges the man to a dual – and wins – but then has to leave anyway to avoid being hanged. On the road, he is robbed of all he has, so he has little choice but to join the British army. He watches as his friend and mentor is killed – so when an opportunity comes up to flee (by impersonating an officer) – he seizes it, only to be caught and forced into the Prussian service – where, although he impresses his superiors, they also note his cruelty and lack of character – which Barry blames on the element he has fallen into (to Barry everything is someone else’s fault). Later, he will again seize on an opportunity to run away – by joining forces with a gambling fraud of a Chevalier – and he lives the life of a gambler. While living this life, he meets Lady Honoria Lyndon (Marisa Berenson) – and her much older, wheelchair bound husband – and sets his sights on her. She falls in love with him, and when her husband dies, marries Barry – who now has the money he has always wanted. But he still has no title – no security – and it is his quest to get this that ultimately leads to his downfall.

Ryan O’Neil has never been a great actor – even at the height of his fame, right before Barry Lyndon, he was more well-known for his generic, non-threatening good looks and easy charm than his acting ability. I wouldn’t call his performance in Barry Lyndon great either – but it is perfect for Kubrick’s purposes. Lyndon is a passive character – in many ways, he remains a blank slate from beginning of the film to the end. There are really only two scenes where he shows any real emotion – when his son dies, and when he attacks his step-son – other than that he remains almost perfectly calm at all moments, betraying little to no emotion. The same can be said for Berenson as Lady Lyndon – she was a model, and Kubrick seems to have cast her for her looks more than anything else. These characters almost seem like observers of their own lives than active participants. Barry does nothing on his own initiative – he is forced into almost everything he does, by the army, by his mother, by his stepson, etc. He becomes cold and cruel – and everyone in the film is willing to exploit him for his wife’s money. Its how the game is played, and as long as Barry conducts himself as a proper gentleman, they are willing to pretend he is one of them.

The film is a master class in filmmaking. Everything in the film is precise and beautifully executed – it is in fact one of the most beautiful films ever made. In particular, the cinematography by John Alcott is one of the best achievements the medium has ever seen. The exteriors are bright and beautiful – with Kubrick’s typical, sweeping shots. The interiors are even better – using only natural light, and the light provided by the candles, the interiors are dark, yet opulent. The film, like his two previous films 2001 and A Clockwork Orange, makes good use of classical music, adapted for the movie itself – which heighten the movie, without underlining everything. The film moves at a deliberate pace – even a dual in the second half of the film stretches on for minutes on end, which drains it of its energy – which stands in stark contrast to the dual near the beginning of the film, which is over and done with quickly.

The film is not as exciting as many of Kubrick’s films – but that is by design. Roger Ebert compared the film to 2001 – saying that “both films about organisms striving to endure and prevail – and never mind the reasons. The earlier film was about the human race itself; this one is about a depraved minor example of it”. That is true in many ways. Barry is a man, who like all Kubrick protagonists (save for Spartacus) is not driven by anything greater than himself – not by his beliefs or ideals or emotions. He is a selfish, cruel character who gets what he wants because he is able to be whatever he needs to be at any moment – and then completely abandon that act when it no longer suits his purposes. Barry sees himself as a victim – I think he does anyway, it’s hard to know precisely what Barry is thinking at any point in the film – but his rise and fall is all because of his own actions. He cannot see that – but Kubrick does.

I know that many people will see Barry Lyndon as long and slow and one of those movies where “nothing happens”. Let them say that if they wish. There is a lot going on in Barry Lyndon – it is a clear, cold eyed view from Stanley Kubrick of a man that had he been real, history would have long forgotten. The epilogue of the movie perhaps sums up the movie better than anything I could say “It was in the reign of George III that the aforesaid personages lived and quarreled; good or bad, handsome or ugly, rich or poor they are all equal now”. That line provides more insight into the human condition – and into Barry Lyndon himself – than the character could ever hope to have.

The Films of Stanley Kubrick: A Clockwork Orange (1971)

A Clockwork Orange (1971)
Directed by: Stanley Kubrick.
Written by:  Stanley Kubrick based on the novel by Anthony Burgess.
Starring: Malcolm McDowell (Alex), Patrick Magee (Mr. Alexander), Michael Bates (Chief Guard), Warren Clarke (Dim), Adrienne Corri  (Mrs. Alexander), Carl Duering (Dr. Brodsky), Michael Gover (Prison Governor), Miriam Karlin (Catlady), James Marcus (Georgie), Aubrey Morris  (Deltoid), Godfrey Quigley (Prison Chaplain), Sheila Raynor (Mum), Madge Ryan (Dr. Branom), Philip Stone (Dad).

A Clockwork Orange is infamous for its controversial depiction of violence. Stanley Kubrick shoots the violence in the film with the same glee that the film’s protagonist, Alex (Malcolm McDowell) commits it. But Kubrick also frontloads the violence in the film so it’s almost all right near the beginning. Within the first five minutes, Alex and his “droogs” have beat up a homeless man – from there, Kubrick goes immediately to a rival gang on the verge of gang raping a young woman, which turns into a gang war with Alex and his gang, and then right from there Kubrick goes cuts to Alex and his gang driving recklessly down the street, running others off the road, and then goes immediately into the scene where Alex sings “Singin’ in the Rain” as he beats up an old man, and then rapes his wife. All of this happens within the first 15 minutes of the film. Kubrick keeps going with the violence in the movie for another 15 minutes – the infamous fast forwarded threesome with Alex and two teenage girls, his fight with his own gang, and then the second home invasion – with the cat lady – when Alex plays with her phallic sculpture, and then attacks her – leaving her dead – and then he’s confronted by his gang, attacked and left for the cops to clean up. Within the first 30 minutes of a movie that runs well over 2 hours, Kubrick has had almost all of the graphic violence the film will contain – the violence from that point on is still there, but it’s shown much quicker – Kubrick doesn’t dwell on the violence later in the film, and doesn’t show it with the same glee that the violence in that first 30 minutes is show.

All of this is done on purpose. Kubrick wants to establish right off the bat what kind of person Alex is – Tasha Robinson, in her excellent essay from September, would refer to Alex as one of cinema’s “irredeemable protagonists” – a lead character who is rotten to the core and not only isn’t going to get better, but has no interest in getting better. Alex goes through a lot in last hour and forty-five minutes of A Clockwork Orange – but he remains precisely how he is. The reason Kubrick does this is because more than anything else, A Clockwork Orange is a film about free will. Like the old saying about free speech goes - `Freedom of speech means nothing without the freedom to offend`. The same is basically true of free will – it doesn’t mean anything if you cannot choose to do evil. Alex is an evil character to be sure –but he is a human being right up to the point where the government takes away his ability to choose to be good or evil – then he ceases to be human. Kubrick could very well have made movie with the same message that was easier to take – to make Alex a more likable character who had his free will taken away from him – but that would have been a much safer, much less interesting film – because how could anyone argue against an innocent person losing their free will. By arguing that someone as evil as Alex deserves the freedom to choose to be good or evil makes A Clockwork Orange a much more daring, much more memorable film.

A Clockwork Orange was an interesting choice for Kubrick coming off of 2001: A Space Odyssey – which is Kubrick’s most hopeful film, one that shows humanity place in the universe, and argues that we have room to grow as a species. To Kubrick, the history of humanity wasn’t the same view that religious people take – that looks at how far we have fallen from the Garden of Eden in paradise – but how far we have come from the time we were apes. A Clockwork Orange is probably the darkest film in Kubrick’s career – but is still keeping in line with his view. Like 2001, he creates an entire universe in A Clockwork Orange – and it’s one of the most memorable in film history. The film takes place in some sort of future dystopia – but Kubrick doesn’t spend any time telling us how humanity got to this point, or even really what this point is. There are some references to politics – and before Alex undergoes the treatment to cure him of his violent ways, it is mentioned that all the room in prison will soon be needed for political prisoners. What those prisoners’ crimes are is never mentioned – I think because Alex doesn’t really care. He never sees beyond his most immediate needs and wants – he doesn’t care about the world around him. Kubrick lets that world seep in around the edges – but only to a point.

The production design, the cinematography, the use of classical music and the costumes are all as well executed as they were in 2001 – Kubrick was a master at world building, but he keeps that in the background. We spend the entire movie with Alex – brilliantly played by Malcolm McDowell, who does nothing to make Alex likable – which strangely makes him all the more interesting. McDowell goes over the top from the beginning, and keeps it there – it’s a portrait of a youth who just doesn’t care as disturbing as anything we’ve seen in the movies. None of the other characters leave anywhere near the same impact as Alex – they come and go quickly – leaving as soon as Alex has no use for them.

The violence in the movie is strong and disturbing – but it’s the later scenes that are perhaps even more disturbing. Alex is used as a test subject for a new treatment – drug therapy combined with been strapped down and forced to watch violent movies, which eventually make him physically ill when he even contemplates violence. This is an abuse of government power to be sure – and something the audience would never except with a more innocent character. And that is what makes A Clockwork Orange so memorable – Kubrick makes you at least consider what the government is doing to Alex, and its benefits. Clearly society cannot function with people like Alex – who rape, kills, beat and rob whoever they want – but what are they supposed to do with them. You may well find yourself agreeing with the government – which when you consider the implications makes the film more disturbing.

I have probably seen A Clockwork Orange more times than any other Kubrick movie. It immediately draws you in, but leaves you shaken and disturbed. Many critics – like Roger Ebert – do not seem to be able to get over the violence, and do not much want to dig in much deeper to what Kubrick is doing in the film. That violence at the beginning of the film is strong and memorable – but it’s only the tip of the iceberg to what Kubrick is doing here. It needs to be that strong for Kubrick’s purposes. I understand if you don’t want to spend too much time with Alex – but you’re missing out if you don’t.

The Films of Stanley Kubrick: 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
Directed by: Stanley Kubrick.
Written by: Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke.
Starring: Keir Dullea (Dr. Dave Bowman), Gary Lockwood (Dr. Frank Poole), William Sylvester (Dr. Heywood R. Floyd), Daniel Richter (Moon-Watcher), Leonard Rossiter (Dr. Andrei Smyslov), Margaret Tyzack (Elena), Robert Beatty (Dr. Ralph Halvorsen), Sean Sullivan (Dr. Bill Michaels), Douglas Rain (HAL 9000), Frank Miller (Mission Controller).

The word “visionary” is thrown around far too often these days in regards to films and filmmakers – somehow even Zack Snyder is a “visionary director” according the previews of his films. But one of the few films in history that could legitimately be described as visionary is Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. It’s one of the few films in history that look seriously at man’s place in the universe. It is the best science fiction ever made, but it’s more than that. It has been described as spiritual film, even if the ultimate view of the film is one of an atheist. It contains some of the most stunning sequences ever put on film, and has perhaps the best ending of any film ever made. I placed the film on my list of the 10 best ever made when I did that list back in 2012 – and watching it again, I thought it was even better than I had remembered.

The film is basically made up of four movements. The first is entitled the “Dawn of Man”, and shows us apes, who very slowly evolve over the roughly 20 minutes Kubrick spends with them. They slowly start to learn – especially with the arrival of some sort of monolith in their word. This jumpstarts the apes intelligence – given one of them the idea of picking up a bone, and using it as a tool – a tool of violence, but a tool just the same. After the best smash cut in history – in which millions of years go by in the blink of an eye – we are in the second movement. Dr. Heywood R. Floyd (William Sylvester) is called to a base on the moon in the year 1999. Something strange is happening there, and we only slowly learn what that is. Another monolith has been discovered – and no one knows what it means. But it is not man made, and it is not natural. The third movement is takes place 18 months later – when a team of astronauts are sent on a journey to beyond Jupiter – although they are not made aware of why until right near the end of their journey. Three astronauts are put into hibernation – and the other two, Dave Bowman (Keir Dullea) and Frank Poole (Gary Lockwood) are to pilot the ship to where it needs to be – with the help of the most advanced computer in history – the HAL 9000 – which never makes mistakes, and speaks like a real human. The last movement takes place after the journey has gone wrong – and Dave goes through a star gate, and ends up in a different place – which leads to one of most iconic final shots in cinema history.

To talk about 2001 in terms of plot is to miss the point. The film certainly does have a narrative, but it is hardly the narrative that the film is about. Nor is the film really about its characters – the most memorable character is clearly HAL, which is nothing more than a red light, and a great vocal performance by Douglas Rain. The astronauts themselves – Bowman and Poole – are pretty much interchangeable, and are given little to no depth. That is by design of course – the film isn’t about these specific men – but rather it is about mankind as a collective.

The film is also about the visuals. Kubrick worked for years on the film, in conjunction with special effects guru Douglas Trumbull – which created some of the best special effects sequences ever put on film. To write about the docking at the space station early in the film, or the various shots of people walking upside down, or Bowman’s “murder” of HAL or the star gate sequence would not do them justice. Nor would talking about Kubrick’s brilliant use of classical music, which doesn’t underline the action the way scores do, but do help enhance both the sequences and music. This is just one of those films you have to experience or you will never understand just how brilliant it all is.

The film’s ending is much debated, but really isn’t all that hard to figure out. Bowman follows the path of whoever put the monoliths there, and ends up, after a mesmerizing star gate sequence (that remains a favorite among stoners, although its effect is great even if you’re completely sober when you see it) – and ends up in a different place – where he sees himself at various stages of his life – for a moment there are two Bowman’s, until there is only one. And then Bowman, as we know him in human form is gone – replaced by the iconic star child. The film is ultimately about how far humanity has evolved from when we were nothing more than apes – but also how much further we have to go.

2001: A Space Odyssey is one of the greatest films ever made – and yet I have a hard time writing about it. It is a film that has to be seen to be believed – and then seen again and again to contemplate its deeper meanings – or simply to sit back and watch with wonder at what Kubrick has achieved in the film. It says something about the film that it is the most hopeful of all of Kubrick’s film, yet is still completely in line with his dim view of humanity that is on display in all of his films.