Stanley Kubrick, World-Class Filmmaker and 'EastEnders' Fan
By Suzanne Campbell
"The screen is a magic medium. It has such power that it can retain interest as it conveys emotions and moods that no other art form can hope to tackle." * Stanley Kubrick, 1970
On March 7th in this final year of the 1900s, the world lost one of the most innovative, influential filmmakers ever to look through a camera lens: Stanley Kubrick. The genius of a man who brought us the biting adaptation of Anthony Burgess' novel A Cloc kwork Orange, the epic period film of scoundrel Barry Lyndon, the most successful film adaption of Stephen King, The Shining, suffered a heart attack and died in his sleep at the age of 70.
Born in the Bronx, New York, Kubrick spent the early part of his life stateside. Artistic frustration-along with a fear that life in New York was no longer safe for him and his family-led him to self-exile. In the late 1960s, Kubrick and his family took u p residence in the U.K. where he lived there for the remainder of his life. Much to my surprise and joy, I discovered that the man I idolize as an artist of unflappable artistic integrity shared with me a common soft spot for EastEnders. According to Jonathan Jones of The Guardian, Kubrick "watched EastEnders in his Hertfordshire hideaway" (23 Oct. 1999). Kubrick-a man who influenced, intimidated and infatuated the moviegoing public with the ultraviolence of A Clockwork Orange (which sparked not only controversy but so many threats against Kubrick and his family that he banned h is own film in his new homeland), and the steamy controversy of Lolita and Eyes Wide Shut, allowed himself to be taken away to a humbler world of open-air markets and pints at the pub as a regular viewer of EastEnders.
When one looks at the illustrious body of work in Kubrick's lifetime, one would not immediately associate such a dark, brooding, cinematic mind with the likes of British soap.
Or would one?
Since discovering Kubrick's favourable opinion of EastEnders, not a frame of an episode goes by without my envisioning it through his eyes. Some rather interesting parallels have begun to rise to the surface.
The 1972 classic, A Clockwork Orange, embodies many elements familiar to EastEnders. Alex, the leader of the futuristic gang of Droogs, comes from humble roots. He lives with his parents in a tenement much like the one in which our Mandy Salter's mum lived.
Lifts many years out of service, broken glass and debris everywhere, sequences of little cells in dilapidated cement towers-it is these circumstances that explain to us why Alex and Mandy chose to lie, cheat and steal to break away from a class that promised nothing but poverty and the mundane; a continuation of which their parents tolerated.
Kubrick leads Alex down the same relentless path that follows Mandy in EastEnders, toward what they saw as redemption, or at least distraction, from their lives.
"Alex's adventures are a kind of psychological myth. Our subconscious finds release in Alex, just as it finds release in dreams. It resents Alex being stifled and repressed by authority, however much our conscious mind recognizes the necessity of doing th is." -Stanley Kubrick
We all know the place of youth gangs in today's society. Be it in the States or the U.K., present or future-adolescents go thrill-seeking. The gang is escapism; their role in the gang gives them individual importance that their role in reality cannot offer-thus Alex and his Droogs, Martin Fowler and his mates. Their missions of power and easy wealth para llels to the hopes of Martin's current social circle. Martin's motives are not as ill-hearted as his mates', but he seeks escapism and a way to channel his rage and bitterness.
Martin will undoubtedly triumph in the end, as Fowlers do; he was a good kid who veered off track at not handling his father's death well. In A Clockwork Orange, however, Alex is a disturbed individual to the bone. Kubrick took a bold stance regarding Alex's character. Although Burgess originally slated Alex for redemption in his novel, Kubrick felt that thi s weakened the message of the film.
According to Burgess, "It wasn't the end of the book I had published in London in 1962. Kubrick had followed the American truncation" (NEON magazine).
After Alex is reprogrammedâ and set loose in society, he is revealed to be the social outcast-the pirate-he always was, thus retaining his true character to the end of the film. While storylines such as Martin's involvement in adolescent gangs are destined for resolution, Nick Cotton continues to be the base character we know and love to hate; he is p robably the closest in character to Alex. Both went through the "straight and narrow" routine; both ultimately failed. Nick-like Alex-had (relatively) straight-laced parents who either didn't know or didn't want to know what their sons did outside the hom e. Nick found himself plunged into a life of heroin and murder. For Alex, it was rape, murder and more assault charges than he could bat his eyelash at. It is in such dark worlds that Kubrick found the psyche of his characters.
Because EastEnders departs from soap opera clich formula, the audience it attracts worldwide is immensely diversified. You and I already knew that.
Knowing that Stanley Kubrick adored EastEnders as I adored his films is heartfelt proof of the universal appeal of our beloved show.
So the next time you pop Dr. Strangelove, The Killing, any Kubrick film in for a viewing, look for a little of Albert Square among the strange and beautiful worlds of Stanley Kubrick.
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