A Clockwork Orange (1971): 20 Dirty Secrets You Never Knew!

Subscribe to get even more Reel Weird:    / @reelweirdmovies   20 Disturbingly Dark Facts You Never Knew About A Clockwork Orange (1971) Get the Movie on DVD: https://amzn.to/4oXMoEV A Clockwork Orange is what happens when you give Stanley Kubrick a dystopian novel, a camera, and absolutely no concern for your psychological well-being. It’s a film that asks, “What if ultraviolence had a soundtrack?” and then answers with Beethoven, milk bars, and a protagonist who looks like he mugged a magician for his wardrobe. So my gorgeous, grinning horrorshows, today we’re diving into 20 weird, disturbing, and “how was this even allowed?” facts about A Clockwork Orange. Number 1: Nadsat isn’t random gibberish. So, Nadsat isn’t just some random nonsense Burgess scribbled down after one too many drinks, it’s actually a carefully built mix of Russian words and Cockney rhyming slang, which is about as strange a combo as vodka and jellied eels, but somehow it works. Words like “horrorshow” for good, “malenky” for little, “devotchka” for girl, and “gulliver” for head sneak their way into the story, and before you know it, you’re halfway to being bilingual in dystopia. Kubrick, being Kubrick, was obsessed with this detail and decided not to water it down for the audience. Instead, he pretty much just copy-pasted Burgess’s slang straight into the script, as if to say, “You’ll figure it out or you won’t, either way, I don’t care.” And it actually worked—viewers had to pay attention, pick up the words, and slowly become fluent in Alex’s messed-up world. In other words, the movie didn’t just make you watch violence and charm go hand in hand; it also made you do homework. Number 2 - Those iconic hats have an interesting history. When it came to figuring out what Alex and his Droogs should look like, John Barry, the costume designer, had a bit of a headache on his hands. The hats in particular were a sticking point—he sketched out more than fifty different designs, trying to nail whatever vague picture Kubrick had in his head. The problem, of course, was that Kubrick always knew what he wanted… right up until you actually asked him to describe it. Then it became a game of trial and error. At one point, while flipping through references, Kubrick spotted this old engraving of a priest’s hat—tall, pointed, kind of severe. He took one look and basically said, “Yeah, that… but creepier.” And just like that, the Droogs got their bizarre white headgear. The result? A gang of violent hooligans who looked less like street punks and more like they were headed to some kind of cult initiation. "Myst" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b... This channel produces original commentary and documentary content about film history. Short clips, trailers, stills and posters may appear strictly for the purposes of criticism, review, education and news reporting. Our use is transformative, we add narration, scripting, editing, research and context, and we limit clip length and quality so our videos do not substitute the originals. This qualifies as “fair use” under 17 U.S.C. §107 in the United States, and “fair dealing” for criticism, review and quotation under the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All film footage, images, characters, trademarks and music remain the property of their respective owners. No affiliation or endorsement is implied. No copyright infringement intended. Original script, narration, edits and thumbnail design are © Reel Weird Movies 2025. All rights reserved. #ReelWeird, #WeirdMovieFacts, #RetroCinema #aclockworkorange #stanleykubrick