Blue Story: Cinema chains pull gang film after 'machete' brawl

[Duty]

Five teenagers including a girl, 13, were arrested in connection with the disturbance, which involved up to 100 young people in a public area of the multiplex, on Saturday night.

In a statement, Vue said the film opened in 60 of its sites across the UK and Ireland on Friday.

"But during the first 24 hours of the film over 25 significant incidents were reported and escalated to senior management in 16 separate cinemas," it said.

"This is the biggest number we have ever seen for any film in a such a short time frame."

BBC news article - significant incidents in 16 different cinemas within 24 hours...I guess the patrons attending this movie have...er...issues? Or perhaps it really does glorify gang feuds and bloody violence to an irresistible degree? Or....

[Rev. Rye]

I should also mention that something similar happened with my favourite film of all time, teens get arrested and blame the movie, and it gets pulled until Stanley Kubrick dies. Of course, it seems nobody had the idiotic sense to commit machete brawls at screenings of A Clockwork Orange.

[Duty]

Something of an aside Rev. Rye, but do you consider Alex and his droogs to be flat out psychopaths?

[Rev. Rye]

Something of an aside Rev. Rye, but do you consider Alex and his droogs to be flat out psychopaths?

Well, in the book, Alex says this about evil:

“They don't go into what is the cause of goodness, so why of the other shop? If lewdies are good that's because they like it, and I wouldn't ever interfere with their pleasures, and so of the other shop. And I was patronizing the other shop. More, badness is of the self, the one, the you or me on our oddy knockies, and that self is made by old Bog or God and is his great pride and radosty. But the not-self cannot have the bad, meaning they of the government and the judges and the schools cannot allow the bad because they cannot allow the self. And is not our modern history, my brothers, the story of the brave malenky selves fighting these big machines?”

While there were changes between the book and the movie (written by Kubrick himself with one hand holding the book and the other hand on his typewriter), I'm inclined to think that things in the book that didn't make it into the movie, but aren't contradicted by the movie still apply. With this in mind, I'm inclined to consider Alex somewhere in between psychopathy and the legal definition of insanity. As for the droogs, I'm more inclined to think of them as just joiners (except for Georgie, who seems pretty sociopathic, at least in the film) who just go along with whoever's giving them orders, whether it's Alex or the state.

[Duty]

He is of course a work of fiction, as are the droogs, but nevertheless, having failed to get past the first chapter or so of the book for unknown reasons thus far, going by the film, I'm calling the lot of them psychos. Anybody who can rejoice in torturing innocents like that...of course the likelihood of 4 such individuals living in geographic proximity....a work of fiction. But it's set "in the future" so there's something of an out there...perhaps humanity could virtually entirely disappear from the planet in the next decade or so and be replaced with psychopathic demons but....unlikely? Thankfully.

[Rev. Rye]

of course the likelihood of 4 such individuals living in geographic proximity....a work of fiction. But it's set "in the future" so there's something of an out there...

Honestly, I've heard it estimated that about anywhere between 1-4% of the general population fits the criteria for psychopathy, so I don't think that's anywhere as unlikely as you believe, even in a community of 150 (and there's no way in Hell Alex lives in a town that small), that's enough for up to six psychopaths. I myself live in a town of 70,000, and that number should allow for 700-2800 psychopaths. And the location for Alex's home was in Thamesmead South, with a population of about 24,000. So, about 240-960 could be expected there.

And then it's shockingly easy for the other 98% to just go along with it. Just read about the Milgram experiment (or, for lighter reading, Asch's conformity experiment) for more information, or just Donald Trump's base.

Also, the film is set in the future, but it's a future that's specifically designed to look as much like 1970 England as possible, whether it's just to keep the budget down after 2001 or to keep it from being too distant to the audience.

[Duty]

I've also heard it said that most psychopaths integrate seamlessly into society, as that's what serves them best. The "criminally insane homicidal/rapist/sadist psychopath type are a TINY minority of those who merely hold a profound empathy deficit. Alex and the droogs are wicked, wicked, wicked men who delight in the torture of innocents in a fictional book and film. Talking snakes etc.

---

Comparing in the flesh raping, beating and murdering to the Milgram et al experiments seems...blunt?

[The Grand Nudger]

27,830-111,320. I don't know if the low end or the high end would explain more about the bay.

[Rev. Rye]

I've also heard it said that most psychopaths integrate seamlessly into society, as that's what serves them best. The "criminally insane homicidal/rapist/sadist psychopath type are a TINY minority of those who merely hold a profound empathy deficit. Alex and the droogs are wicked, wicked, wicked men who delight in the torture of innocents in a fictional book and film. Talking snakes etc.

---

Comparing in the flesh raping, beating and murdering to the Milgram et al experiments seems...blunt?

Admittedly, the Milgram example is more relevant to the joiners (specifically Pete and Dim in my estimation) for why they delight in all those things: because authority figures convince them it's okay. That said, bear in mind WHY Milgram did that experiment in the first place; it's not like he woke up one morning and said "I've got a nutty idea, I'm going to take some rando and see if I can convince him to administer lethal voltage to some old guy just by telling him to." It was his attempt at figuring out, in his words, "Could it be that Eichmann and his million accomplices in the Holocaust were just following orders? Could we call them all accomplices?"

---

27,830-111,320.  I don't know if the low end or the high end would explain more about the bay.

Tampa Bay?

[chimp3]

The prudes have a beef with movie violence unless it is John Wayne murdering Indigenous people. In film and literature violence is simply a plot device, that is all. If your kid becomes a violent psychopath I am sure there were early warning signs unrelated to videos. You should have paid attention.