Thinking happy thoughts: MindRoom in the works for Canucks

VANCOUVER — In director Stanley Kubrick’s classic 1971 film A Clockwork Orange, a violent criminal named Alex DeLarge undergoes experimental aversion therapy as authorities try to psychologically reprogram him.

DeLarge, brilliantly played by Malcolm McDowell, has his eyelids clamped open and is forced to watch graphic nasty bits of ultra-violence on film while suffering drug-induced nausea all to the music of Beethoven. DeLarge quickly associates his suffering with violence and Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony and is cured. Completely disarmed psychologically, he returns to the community stripped of any coping skills and soon tries to kill himself.