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DVD The Manchurian Candidate (Widescreen Edition)
The Manchurian Candidate, a classic of paranoid cinema from the 1960s, gets a cunning update, rife with hot-topic references to corporate war profiteering and electronic voting machines. Major Ben Marco (Denzel Washington, Training Day) has been haunted by nightmares ever since a firefight during the first Gulf War--a battle in which he believes he was saved by the heroism of Sgt. Raymond Shaw (Liev Schreiber, Kate & Leopold). But Marco's nightmares suggest otherwise and drive him to investigate what happened, which may threaten Shaw's candidacy for vice-president. Meryl Streep plays Shaw's mother, a senior senator who manipulates everyone around her with an iron will and a sharp tongue. The Manchurian Candidate loses steam towards the end, but up until then director Jonathan Demme keeps the movie rolling fluidly, crafting some creepy paranoia of his own while Streep tears into everything in her path. --Bret Fetzer
Review(s): DVD The Manchurian Candidate (Widescreen Edition)
Everything Is Under Control...
I was exited to hear that there would be a remake of the 1962 Frank Sinatra classic The Manchurian Candidate, and excited still to learn that it would star two of Hollywood's finest in Streep and Washington, but what interested me the most was that the film would be directed by Academy Award winner Jonathon Demme (The Silence of the Lambs). Demme, in my opinion, is the king of suspense. His trademark actor-looks-straight-into-camera shots are amazing. He takes something so simple and fuels it with suspense and horror, and it's only heightened by the fact that it appears the characters are looking directly at us. But alas, even the fine actors and wonderful Demme couldn't save this film.
It starts off brilliantly. Demme uses his close-ups and the tension mounts from scene to scene. Even scenes that aren't intended to be suspenseful teem with a sense of pervading fear, overlapped by distant news media reports of growing violence in the Middle East. Washington is very effective in the role of the shaken Capt. Bennett Marco. The dream sequences are horrific, complete with terrifying tattooed women and images of murder. But as the movie progresses, it begins to disappoint. The cable news images are almost unbearably tacky (although perhaps that was intentional as a device to show the utter absurdity of the 24-hour news beast). Also, the rules of American politics seem not to apply to the purposes of this film. If you are in any way a pursuer of the Beltway, it will annoy you that this film invents political processes where they do not exist. At times, it moves too quickly, leaving gaps that concern revelation and understanding. In one scene, Capt. Marco denies having ever had nightmares of his tenure in the Gulf War, soon we learn that this is a lie, and in an instant, we find him sitting before an army counsel alleging that he and his men were brainwashed to believe that now-congressman Raymond Prentiss Shaw (Liev Schreiber) heroically saved their lives. Yet, this is news to us, we had no idea this was how the Captain felt. When did he reach this conclusion? There are far too many instances like this.
In the end, this is still a good film and deserving of certain praise if for nothing more than the brilliance in which Meryl Streep portrays the insanely evil Sen. Ellie Shaw, a movie villain of the utmost stature. But that being said, it could have been so much more. It was smart to attempt to cash in on the fear that now possesses what I am certain will come to be known as the Age of Terror, but in the end, the movie misses it's mark. It had that potential to be a dark satire of the deviant world of American politics and a smart horror presentation of the world at present, but unfortunately, it fails to deliver.
contemporary spin on a classic
Jonathan Demme's "The Manchurian Candidate" is a superb and timely 21st Century remake of John Frankenheimer's 1962 classic of Cold War terror and paranoia. For this new version, the Cold War has been replaced by the War on Terror as the menacing background against which the story unfolds, but, apart from that, the major plot points in both films are virtually the same. Both involve a group of soldiers who are brainwashed into believing that one of them, Sergeant Raymond Shaw, is a hero whose unquestioning bravery and quick thinking on the battlefield saved the lives of most of the men in that squadron. (The original's Korean War setting has been updated to the Gulf War's Desert Storm). In fact, upon his return, Shaw is awarded the Medal of Honor, a tribute he eventually parlays into a career as a United States congressman. After several of the men in the squadron begin having the same recurring nightmare in which they are being subjected to murderous hypnotic suggestions, one of them, Captain/Major Bennett Marco, comes to suspect that they may all be the victims of some nefarious scheme to implant them with microchips to get them to believe something that is not true. One of the few key differences between the new version and the old version is that the "Manchurian" of the title no longer refers to the Communists who do the brainwashing but rather to a mega-corporation (called Manchurian Global) that has positioned itself as the master puppeteer pulling the strings of government behind the scenes. And in its scathing vision of modern day politics, the film asks just how much of our freedom and civil liberties we are willing to sacrifice in exchange for "security" and "safety." No theme could be more timely.
It would be a disservice to "The Manchurian Candidate" to reveal too much about its ingeniously contrived plot, which is chock full of intrigue, suspense and larger-than-life events and people. The dominating figure in the nightmare scenario is Eleanor Shaw, an uber-powerful senator and the ultimate Machiavellian matriarch, whose unrelenting and nefarious effort to get her craven, mediocre Congressman son elected Vice President, serves as the engine that pulls the story forward. Thus, while Marco spends his time trying to piece together some semblance of the truth out of the fabricated memories and distorted half-truths spinning around in his jumbled memory and mind, Eleanor works her way to the ultimate position of power.
This new "Candidate" gleans its topicality and its contemporary significance by zeroing in on the nexus that exists between politics and the corrupt military-industrial complex - a connection made even more frightening when the latter, working in a moral vacuum, is able to employ the latest in technological advancements to further its cause.
Although the surrealistic elements are probably less shocking today than they were in 1962, the film still does an amazing job replicating the dislocation and fragmentation of Marco's mind, establishing a beautiful balance between the world of "real" reality and the world of virtual reality, a concept that seems far less incredible in this day and age of ubiquitous computer technology.
Denzel Washington takes over the role of Marco, originally played by Frank Sinatra, and Live Schreiber replaces Laurence Harvey as the mother-dominated Shaw. Both actors are superb. But it is Meryl Streep, stepping in for Angela Lansbury as the Big Bad Mama Supreme, who walks off with the film. Her portrayal of a ruthless and icy Lady MacBeth who will stop at nothing to get what she wants is bone-chilling and unforgettable.
In an age in which most thrillers are formulaic, empty exercises in high-tech wizardry and flash, perhaps it was necessary to reach back 42 years to find a work of power and substance to remind us of just how dangerous it is to allow modern technology to fall into the hands of the power-hungry and the ruthless. Indeed, what this gripping tale of an attempted coup against the United States government manages to do is to remind us that, even in this age of international terrorism, the greatest threat to our unity as a nation and our safety as a people may actually come from within.
The PM Lady MacBeth rocks out...
THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE(the second)is fast-paced,rife with paranoia political sci-fi thriller. Denzel Washington & Liev Schrieber are fine as mutally duped,genetically-warped clones who are pawns of THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE. Manchurian Global is a dark,Masonic oligarchy out to rule the world.Its POOHBAH is Meryl Streep playing PM's LADY MACBETH to the max. If you like Hillary Clinton you'll hate this movie. (Forget non sequiturs about The Original). Meryl equals Hillary;that's why the movie played about two weeks. THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE is a frightening,political thriller that satirizes one of the most ruthless demogogical cabals now in existence. To HC or not HC? That is the question. Lady MacBeth/Meryl Streep/New York Senator Shaw supplies an answer that OUGHT to unsettle all but the most oblivious Demo-homies.(2 & 1/2 stars)
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