What's the AFI Project, you ask? For more information, or if you just enjoy my bemused ramblings, read here:http://www.spout.com/blogs/pippin06/archive/2008/3/1/25756.aspx
The Manchurian Candidate is on the following AFI lists:
The Original Top 100 (#67)
100 Most Heart-Pounding Movies (#17)
100 Years...100 Heroes and Villains (Mrs. John Iselin is the #21 villain)
This is a film that I have been looking forward to watching for quite a while now. After all, the plot summary alone is intriguing, but then, the film received a high-profile remake treatment featuring the likes of Denzel Washington and Meryl Streep. I swore off the remake (even as the previews tantalized and teased me) in favor of the original because I knew it was on my AFI lists and because, from everything I've ever read or been told, the original far surpasses its successor. I'm happy to say, my anticipation was well rewarded because this is one of the best films I've ever seen, i think, or it's at least the best film I've seen in awhile. Also, the film, like Network, is unusually prophetic, even if the entire plot arises from Cold War paranoia that no longer exists - at least not in the same shape and form.
The film's beginning is confusing because the viewer is given a few misdirections in order to hide highly satisfying twists and turns that pop up as the picture progresses, so I'm probably going to rely on the Spout page's plot summary a bit more than normal. As the film opens, American soldiers in the Korean War are in a bar, enjoying a little R & R, before their commanding officer, Sergeant Raymond Shaw (Laurence Harvey), comes in and orders them back on duty. It's clear from their begrudging acquiescence that the soldiers have no love for their CO, but they follow him on patrol anyway, where they are ambushed and taken by Korean troops. The film then flashes to months into the future. Shaw has received the Congressional Medal of Honor, and all of his former platoon call him "the bravest, finest, and most lovable man I've ever met." It becomes clear, particularly to Captain Bennett Marco (Frank Sinatra), that the men underwent brainwashing and thought control at the hands of their captors. Some experience nightmares and visions, others behave erratically, but Marco can't seem to shake the feeling that the dreams and behaviors he is exhibiting aren't his own. Through petitions to his own commanding officers and investigatory arms in the military, he begins to piece together clues that lead him to conclude that Shaw was programmed by a Chinese and Russian coalition who have turned him into an indiscriminate killing machine, able to assassinate anyone on command and then forget his actions later. While Shaw contends with blackouts related to this programming, he is also harangued and used for political gain by his highly ambitious, uncompromising and seemingly unfeeling mother (Angela Lansbury), the puppetmaster behind her husband, John Iselin's (James Gregory), congressional career. He's vying for the vice presidential nomination fueled by his wife's carefully orchestrated anti-Communist hysteria. Shaw, in the meantime, spends his time attempting to separate himself from her unrelenting claws, even as Marco befriends him in an effort to find the source of the conspiracy that led to their capture.
I loved this film. What a picture to be made in 1962, when the country was still in the throes of pearl necklaces and white picket fences and apron strings and Father Knows Best, before Kennedy was assassinated and the Vietnam War. True, the film's plot, which was based on a novel, is rooted in something that has long since faded into memory, but echoes of the anti-Communist agenda ring as true now as they once did, with today's focus being on terrorism and the nameless jihad directed toward the western world.
This film works on every level because it is smart, savvy, foresighted, and poignant. It's intense; the paranoic tone is perpetuated throughout the film thanks to the on-point direction of John Frankenheimer and the against-type performances of Frankie and Murder, She Wrote. I have never seen a film where Angela Lansbury plays the villain, and I'm not sure I ever want to again! What a vile, odious woman she played, so far removed from Bedknobs and Broomsticks and Mrs. Potts and other Disney-approved creations. Her performance more than earns her spot on the Heroes and Villains list because her snake-like character comes out of nowhere and has more layers than a casserole. While the film offers so many reasons to watch and appreciate it, Ms. Lansbury stole the show with one of the most fully-realized and complex villains to ever hit the screen.
Sinatra also gave a career-defining performance as Marco. His chemistry with Janet Leigh (who plays his random love interest; they meet on a train) was a little off, but Marco's tenacity, conflict, and determination are well-played by the erstwhile crooner. Shaw also expertly offered a layered performance of the ultimate brainwashed though innocent stooge, even if his actual character and performance were a bit theatrical at times.
The film was also directed well. The tone was consistently intense, and the pacing was consistently at the level of a slow boil that popped at just the right moments. My heart pounded at several key points when reveals, both expected and unexpected, occurred. Some of the key twists the viewer might see coming, but Frankenheimer and company make the viewer work for it and plant just the right amount of doubt, so that no conclusion is truly foregone.
The most creative segments of the film - and the most confusing - were during the Chinese/Russian coalition's demonstration of their brainwashing success. The filmmakers decided to alternately show the actual room the soldiers were in, with levels like in the United Nations only populated by representatives of major Communist countries, and a garden tea party, the vision the soldiers were duped into having as this demonstration progressed. Some of the switching back and forth grew confusing and tedious but, ultimately, the creative stroke was effective, particularly in its misdirection.
The reviews on this page call The Manchurian Candidate a satire. I don't know if I agree with that categorization, since satire usually implies a comic angle to the piece. While some black comedy might have been present in the film, I wouldn't give it any kind of overarching comedic label, because I never laughed. If the humor was there, it was based in subtle irony - more subtle and insidious than the irony found in something like Dr. Strangelove. The Manchurian Candidate is ultimately a thriller and a very well-constructed one to boot (it also deserves its ranking on the appropriate AFI list). It elicited a thumping heart on many occasions from me.
With a razor-sharp script, again prophetic as its political and social commentary transcends the year in which the film was released; consistent and expert direction; and uniformly great performances, The Manchurian Candidate is a great film. It's surprising, but the AFI chose not to add this to its Revised list, and this is one of the best films I've seen from the Original lineup, at least in this bottom half (incidentally, it was replaced by Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, which was new to the Revised list). For all these reasons and more, this film received a five-star rating from me. I also think it merits an 8.5 on the patented ratings scale between very good/minor flaws and perfectly entertaining, owing to some of the confusion brought on by the alternate realities. This is really just one flaw, and I only feel this way because it really did grow tedious (which prevents me from calling the film perfectly entertaining or better). As to the test, I may very well buy this one. It would be interesting to add the cynicism and paranoia of this film to my collection, juxtaposed with Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, and all of its hopeful optimism in the face of political corruption. Incidentally, I've read the plot summary of the remake since viewing this film, and I don't feel that I can honestly bring myself to watch it, Meryl Streep or no. Is there someone who can convince me otherwise because the original was just too good?