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Similarities Between A Clockwork Orange And American Psycho

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American Psycho and A Clockwork Orange highlight and present demoralization of society through the use of narcissistic figures, who utilize violence to reflect their desire for dominance. Burgess and Ellis within their novel construct a single character that conflicts with the alleged moral beliefs of the society that besiege around them. One could argue that in both novels the drive of violence that the characters manifest orientate to the societies which the novels uphold. American Psycho reflects the time it was written in - an American consumerist society in the late 1980s, early 1990s in which moral ideals were overlooked as desires were very much dependent on opportunities to make money. Ellis uses the 1980s New York setting to express …show more content…

Burgess uses the setting of the 1960s to explore the order of society that imposed certain ideals on citizens and how people were stripped of their identity and morals. There is no doubt that both novels explore the demoralization of society through the perspective of narcissistic male narrators. The narcissistic nature of the central characters, Alex and Bateman are portrayed in their treatment of women, who they see merely as objects and nothing more, thus degrading them in society 's eyes. ‘A Clockwork Orange’ has been notably criticized for its presentation women; feminist critic Beverly Walker claims in A Clockwork Orange 'all of the women are portrayed as caricatures; the violence committed upon them is treated comically '. The representation of women in American Psycho is demonstrated in a similar way, with violent treatment of women being underlined with comic remarks, expressing the narcissistic nature of Bateman, but also his lack of morality. In 'A Clockwork Orange ', women are immediately presented as merely something to voyeur in the first chapter opening with the Korova Milk Bar. The bar consists of naked mannequin

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Life is full of decisions, but they are subconsciously influenced by society. This influence has created an unhealthy relationship between social classes. How people choose to act is in complete correlation to society’s set expectation for a certain class. These actions then become reflections of people’s moral values. In Tony McAdam’s criticism of The Great Gatsby, Ethics in Gatsby, he points out the corruption of characters morals due to society’s influence and the impact that has on decision making.

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Authors, especially female authors, have long used their writing to emphasize and analyze the feminist issues that characterize society, both in the past and the present. Kate Chopin, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and Susan Glaspell wrote narratives that best examined feminist movements through the unreliable minds of their characters. In all three stories, “The Story of an Hour”, “The Yellow Wallpaper”, and “A Jury of Her Peers”, the authors use characterization, symbolism, and foreshadowing to describe the characters’ apparent psychosis or unreasonable behavior to shed light on the social issues that characterized the late 19th century and early 20th century. Penning many stories that demonstrate her opinions on the social issues of the era,

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The short stories, "A Good man is Hard to Find" by Flannery O'Conner and "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner are rather horrifying; one tale is about a grandmother and her family brutally murdered by a coldhearted killer, and the other tale is about a lady who murders her lover and then sleeps beside his rotting body. Not only have O'Conner and Faulkner created similar plots in their respective stories, both authors criticize the Southern corruption through the distortion of the characters' world view of reality. The use of irony in the character's social statuses and their miserable lives illustrate the authors' criticism of the Southern social structure. The stories include insights into the families of the old south, and the older class system of

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In the film American Psycho, the director uses satire to illustrate the life of Patrick Bateman, a typical Yuppie in the 1980’s who is a monster because of his psychotic tendencies, which are influenced by his destructive male ego. Set during the 1980’s in New York City, Patrick Bateman is an attractive, and successful man. He is ivy-league educated, works at a high-profile Wall Street financial firm, takes excellent care of his physique and engaged to an intelligent blonde named Evelyn who is “almost perfect looking.” Patrick also surrounds himself with similar people who share identical backgrounds in wealth and education. The only thing that sets Patrick aside from the rest of his friends is his tendency to mutilate and murder several helpless female

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This analysis will focus on questions of gender and notions of femininity existing during the Great Depression in US Culture, which are reproduced through the film itself. To support my thesis, I will analyze the most important key scenes

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INTRODUCTION “What’s it going to be then, eh?” It is hard to improve upon Anthony Burgess’ classic opening line to his masterpiece. With this bold, taunting question, A Clockwork Orange’s protagonist, 15-year old Alex, opens the door for our descent into a terrifyingly grim world where ultra-violence and apathy pervade a shocking totalitarian society. The book is partly written in a Russian-influenced argot called nadsat which serves to minimize the horror of the violence depicted. It revolves around a devastatingly simple premise; when state authorities seek to reform young criminals like Alex, Burgess asks- what’s the cost?

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In this, Butler has managed to cook up a perfect dystopian society, reflecting the faults in our own as well. So with theses determining factors, the rise of the protagonist can be seen to be even greater an impact as she is not only a youth with extreme knowledge and prophet-like tendencies, but a women fighting against a male dominated society. Feminism doesn't appear as the main event in this novel but still continues to remain in the outlining pages, as it can be seen throughout the book in various elements, especially in the brutal oppression of women. As society within the isolated environment the protagonist dwells within, there is several examples of such brutality and lack of concern for women, although some may say they are regarded as equals. On example being that of Travis and Navidad, as Navidad is relentlessly subjected to sexual harassment with no penalty upon the abuser.

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Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde consists of reputation, good vs evil and damage control. In other words, Utterson tirelessly works to prevent his best friend Dr. Jekyll from being dragged into the horrid affairs of Mr. Hyde, and Dr. Jekyll goes through the greatest of lengths to prevent his Hyde identity from being discovered, in order to avoid anyone knowing of his somewhat questionable scientific work and morally despicable behavior. Much of the novel is based on the characters ' reputations, how they have to maintain a good public image, as they are upper class people. The novel takes place in Victorian England and the main characters are all male members of upper class London.

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Exploitation and intimidation of others to achieve personal goals is considered greed and inhuman acts. All the characters in the novel American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis, demonstrate the theme of greed at one point. The constant desires for money and power are shown through Patrick Bateman’s power dominance of women during sexual intercourse. Although he paid the women money, but he forced them to the point that it is abuse. This greed is especially shown as he is trying obtain power through his rape of women.

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“A Good Man is Hard to Find” a short story written by Flannery O’Connor, a contradiction within itself. By reviewing this short story, we can learn about justice, religion and what it means to be a good man. If we look at how O’Connor represents the conflict of interest in the characters, we will see that this short story warps the idea of humanity, which is important because internally every person has a darker side. These characters just so happen to be wearing that darker side on their sleeves as they go about their daily life.

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Hollywood has always done a terrible job of depicting real women in film, and although his work has a somewhat misogynistic reputation, Alfred Hitchcock has done so much involving the progression of female roles in Hollywood cinema. Although many of his female victims wind up dead, the survivors have lots of power – and without reliance on their male counterparts. Women remain the central focus in many of Hitchcock’s films, not just because of their beauty, but because the narrative is dependent on them. When you look at his work in the context of this specific Hollywood era, Hitchcock’s female characters are very much out of the ordinary. Looking past the obvious presence of gender roles (male and female) that just so happened to be a part of the social norm during that time, Hitchcock sought to represent women with having more depth, realism, and independence than ever before in women in Hollywood.

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The image portrayal of women in this film is a way for the people in our society to see women as not having good standards. As when Waldo is first introduced to the film Darla instantly started gazing after him for being the rich, clean cut young man. Also Boys see girls as a scapegoat when it comes to their problems such as the scene when the club house burned down, and Alfalfa almost lost his best friend he says, “it all happened because I liked a girl” but it was really nothing to do with Darla that caused all of those events to happen it came from him not telling the truth and trying to hide her. One can also see the ideal role a woman should play in society. For instance, after the race Spanky did not expect Darla to be the one that helped them or be the one under the helmet.

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Black women are treated less than because of their ascribed traits, their gender and race, and are often dehumanized and belittled throughout the movie. They are treated like slaves and are seen as easily disposable. There are several moments throughout the film that show the racial, gender, and class inequalities. These moments also show exploitation and opportunity hoarding. The Help also explains historical context of the inequality that occurred during that time period.

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However, film critic, Robin Wood, argues that ‘since Psycho, the Hollywood cinema has implicitly recognised horror as both American and familial’ he then goes on to connect this with Psycho by claiming that it is an “innovative and influential film because it supposedly presents its horror not as the produce of forces outside American society, bit a product of the patriarchal family which is the fundamental institution of American society” he goes on to discuss how our civilisation either represses or oppresses (Skal, 1994). Woods claim then suggests that in Psycho, it is the repressions and tensions within the normal American family which produces the monster, not some alien force which was seen and suggested throughout the 1950 horror films. At the beginning of the 60’s, feminisation was regarded as castration not humanization. In “Psycho” (1960) it is claimed that the film presents conservative “moral lessons about gender roles of that the strong male is healthy and normal and the sensitive male is a disturbed figure who suffers from gener confusion” (Skal, 1994). In this section of this chapter I will look closely at how “Psycho” (1960) has layers of non-hetro-conforming and gender-non conforming themes through the use of Norman Bates whose gender identitiy is portrayed as being somewhere between male and female

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The 1971 film, A Clockwork Orange, consists of many psychological concepts. Two concepts in particular seem to have the biggest impact and role throughout this film. These concepts being, classical conditioning and the idea that our environment and our experiences of nurture are what shapes us. A Clockwork Orange is the story of a group of young men who take pleasure in committing crimes and causing others to feel pain, they call themselves the “Droogs”. Alex, the group leader, suffers from Antisocial Personality Disorder, a disorder also known as “psychopath”.

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