Alex, a young English hoodlum, heads a gang of four other
young hoodlums. Instead of attending school, he spends his time
performing acts of theft, rape, and violence. During the first night
of the film, Alex and his gang members, the Droogs, gather at the
Korova Milk Bar, which serves its patrons drug-laced milk from female
mannequins. They take a drug that makes them hyperaware and ready
for violence, then head out into the night and beat up an old homeless man.
Next they come upon a rival gang about to rape a woman, and initiate
a gang fight. They steal a car and speed out to the country. There,
they don masks, burst into the home of a famous writer, Mr. Alexander,
beat him, and rape his wife. As Alex rips off Mrs. Alexander’s clothes
before the rape, he sings “Singin’ in the Rain” and dances like
Gene Kelly does in the musical of the same name. During this night,
Alex wreaks havoc in such a happy-go-lucky way that his violence
seems motivated by pure enjoyment.
As the night comes to an end, Alex returns to his parents’
apartment in a decrepit working-class housing complex. Before he
climbs into bed, he turns on a symphony by Beethoven. The music
conjures up images of bombings, hangings, and other forms of violence.
In the morning, Alex’s mother wakes him for school, but he says
he feels ill. Though he plays the role of dutiful son, his parents
clearly don’t dare challenge him.
Soon, however, things begin to unravel for Alex. His Droogs have
grown tired of his bullying, and they plan to oust him from power.
The next night, they drive out to the home of a wealthy lady. Alex
breaks in to rob her, but she fights back. In a surreal scene, she seizes
a bust of Beethoven, and Alex seizes a statue of a penis. Just as police
sirens begin to sound, Alex smashes her in the face with the statue
and runs out. Outside, his friends lie in wait. They hit him over
the head with a glass bottle of milk and run away, leaving him to
the police.
During the night he spends in police custody, the woman
dies, and soon the court sentences Alex to fourteen years in prison.
For two years, he behaves like a model prisoner, but he has not
truly reformed. What he wants is freedom. One day, Alex hears rumors circulating
about a new experimental procedure called Ludovico’s Technique.
The government plans to use it to reduce overcrowding in its prisons
and to bring law and order to the streets. Alex doesn’t know what
the treatment entails, but he is excited to hear that if he undergoes
it, the government will release him from prison in just two weeks.
When the minister of the interior visits the prison looking for
a guinea pig, Alex calls attention to himself and is selected.
Soon, prison officials place Alex in the hands of government
doctors, who inject him with a serum, then show him reel upon reel
of violent and sexually explicit films. When he sees the films,
the serum takes effect, and Alex experiences a horrendous illness,
which is brought on by viewing sex or violence. Finally, even without
the serum, he automatically becomes ill when he views images of
violence or thinks any violent thoughts of his own. His violent
impulses are now inhibited by his own physical response. Unfortunately
for Alex, one of the films the doctors show him has a soundtrack
that he adores: the fourth movement of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.
As a result, Alex becomes violently ill whenever he hears it. Still,
he believes he has gotten a good deal when the government sets him free.
When Alex gets home, he finds that his parents have let
his room to a lodger, and they tell him he can’t stay. Outside,
the homeless man Alex once beat up recognizes him, and he and his
elderly homeless friends attack Alex. The police come to his aid,
but they are his old Droogs, criminals now turned cops, and they
drive him out to the country and beat him too. Night falls, a storm
kicks up, and Alex drags himself to the nearest house. Once inside
the house he realizes it’s the home of Mr. Alexander, the writer
he assaulted. Mrs. Alexander, whom he raped, had died soon after
his attack.
At first Mr. Alexander recognizes Alex only as the boy
he’s seen in the newspapers for having undergone Ludovico’s Technique.
Mr. Alexander is a member of an opposition political party, and
he believes that if he can show that Alex suffered cruelly at the
hands of the government, the public may turn against it. He sees
in Alex an opportunity to topple the government and takes Alex into
his house. While he plans his scheme, Alex, soaking in a bath, begins
to feel a little better and starts to sing “Singin’ in the Rain,”
the same song he sang the night of the attack. Mr. Alexander recognizes
the song, and he makes the connection that Alex is his former assailant.
Now he not only wants to use Alex to topple the government but also
wants revenge. He hatches a plan to drive Alex to suicide. Later
in the day, while Alex sleeps, Mr. Alexander and two cronies blast
Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony into Alex’s bedroom. Alex is overcome
with illness, but when he tries to flee, he finds his door locked.
Desperate to escape his illness, he decides to commit suicide. He
jumps from the window.
Alex wakes up in a hospital, after a long time in a coma,
in a full-body cast. While he was unconscious, much happened. Public
opinion and the newspapers did turn against the government, claiming its
cruelty drove Alex to attempt suicide. Mr. Alexander’s plan seems
to be working—but the government has a plan of its own. While Alex
was in a coma, doctors reconditioned him back to his old self. They
have undone the results of Ludovico’s Technique.
The minister of the interior visits Alex in his hospital
bed. Alex is eating his lunch, but because the cast confines his
movements, he cannot feed himself. In a saccharine gesture of concern,
the minister of the interior feeds Alex himself, while Alex slams
his mouth open and shut, enjoying his power. The minister of the
interior tells Alex how the government plans to help him, with a
good job and a good salary. As a final present, the minister of
the interior pipes Beethoven into the room, and Alex does not grow
ill. The two sit together as journalists and cameramen rush in to
capture the moment. As they wave and smile at the cameras, Alex,
inspired by the music, imagines himself having wild sex while proper
English men and women stand around and applaud. “I was cured all
right,” he says as the film ends.
