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Wednesday, June 09, 2021

Andy Warhol - 1965 - Vinyl

 




Vinyl is a 1965 American black-and-white experimental film directed by Andy Warhol at The Factory. It is an early adaptation of Anthony Burgess' 1962 novel A Clockwork Orange, starring Gerard Malanga, Edie Sedgwick, Ondine, and Tosh Carillo, and featuring such songs as "Nowhere to Run" by Martha and the Vandellas, "Tired of Waiting for You" by The Kinks, "The Last Time" by The Rolling Stones and "Shout" by The Isley Brothers.

The film is about the youth perpetrator Victor, who spends his time lifting weights, dancing and torturing people. When he hits his friend Scum Baby, he calls the police. Victor gets the choice to go to jail or undergo a behavioral change. Victor decides on the treatment and is bound to a chair by a doctor. He has to watch violent videos and describe what is happening on the screen while warm wax from a candle runs over his hand. After a while Victor swears off the violence and is unbound. He rejects the doctor's request to beat him and take drugs. Victor is cured.

On her twenty-first birthday in April 1964, Edie Sedgwick received an $80,000 trust fund ($689,171 in today's money which she spent in 6 months) from her maternal grandmother. Soon after, she relocated to New York City to pursue a career in modeling. In March 1965, she met artist and avant-garde filmmaker Andy Warhol at a party at Lester Persky's apartment, and began frequently visiting The Factory, Warhol's art studio in Midtown Manhattan. During one of her subsequent visits, Warhol was filming Vinyl (1965), his interpretation of Anthony Burgess' novel A Clockwork Orange. Despite Vinyl's all-male cast, Warhol put Sedgwick in the movie. Around this time, she also made a small cameo appearance in another Warhol film, Horse (1965). Sedgwick's appearances in both films were brief but generated enough interest that Warhol decided to cast her in the starring role of his next films.

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