A Clockwork Orange

This hugely popular 1971 movie from Stanley Kubrick is a great example of the genius of that director. Far from perfect, it is still obviously a particular kind of 'domestic' (rather than 2001's 'intergalactic') piece from one of the few English language directors who achived greatness (He comes close to the Chaplin, Welles, Hitchcock pantheon).
To get the criticisms out of the way first, the main problem with this film is that it is far too long. The last twenty minutes are frankly a waste of time, seeming there to make a sociological point. The slightly heavy handed sociological analysis and slightly tiresome humour are exacerbated here. The direction can occasionally seem a bit self-consciously 'weird', though this may be the fault of audience anticipation more than anything.
This film has thousands of philosophical fragments which many spend lifetimes picking over, but violence and language are perhaps the most interesting.
Kubrick's aestheticisation of violence is fascinating. In the first shot, indeed throughout, he dares us to identify with a character who commits vile acts. The harmony and beauty of the early violence is perhaps an attempt to make this identification easy, and it is an interesting (Haneke-esque) meditation on cinematic violence that is brought down later by more explicit scenes.
Kubrick is perhaps the master of non-diagetic sound, and his diagetic sound (of which Bresson wins at, we argue) also fascinates. The tinny, airless empty room feel of the dialgoue is effective, and the sound affects, though a little 70's are beautifully timed. Burgess' script is wonderfully evoked, Kubrick uses the voiceover (espeically early on) very affectively to show the weird processes of alienation and smothering in language that occur.
Kubrick's style, using his warped lens, is very particular of an enclosed milleu. The montages and sexualised P.O.V. are of their time, but evoke an atmosphere well.
This is a weird film in that it is at once of its time, very strongly, but that doesn't really harm it. It does have its faults, but achieves first rate excellence in certain techincal and thematic features.