THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE may be the summers biggest surprise. Its a remake that actually compares favorably to the original. Sure, anyone whos seen the previous incarnation will know a few of the bigger plot twists going in, but writers Daniel Pyne and Dean Georgaris have seeded this version with enough surprises to keep things fresh. Plus, director Jonathan Demme has created a compelling claustrophobic, paranoia-inducing world that makes this slick flick a gripping two hours.
The story concerns the aftermath of what happened to a lost patrol commanded by Ben Marco (Denzel Washington) in the first Gulf War when Sgt. Raymond Shaw (Liev Schreiber), the son of a United States Senator, single-handedly saved most of them after an ambush in the desert. It was wildly out of character for this bookish and reclusive scion, but it was enough so that he could return home to a heros welcome, the Congressional Medal of Honor, and a real shot at becoming the Vice President. The thing is, the other survivors of that ill-fated mission have suffered more than the usual sort of post-traumatic shock syndrome. Theyre all having the same disjointed dream, over and over again, involving tubes, needles, and a mad scientist messing with their minds.
Because the story has been updated, this is not just the good old-fashioned brainwashing of the original, but a more sophisticated blend of that and nanotechnology that is truly sinister. The enemy is no longer the godless Commies, but rather a soulless multi-national corporation, Manchuria Global, with campaign contributions to both major parties and allegiance to no one but its bottom line. Compared to them, the Commies were a bunch of teddy bears. And theyre both cream puffs compared to Raymonds emotionally devouring mother (Meryl Streep, never deadlier), a senator herself with politics slightly to the right of Genghis Khan and plans to use her son as a surrogate in the White House.
Into this web of intrigue stumbles Marco, finally convinced his dreams are more than just the ramblings of his unconscious mind, he begins to investigate what the truth is behind the illusion. In the process, of course, he comes up against the Army doctors who have been treating his PTSS, and a whole slew of agents, official and other, who listen to his crazy story and try to convince him that hes loony, too.
Throughout, there is an off-kilter ambiguity about whats real in Marcos world and whats not, whats a real memory and whats been planted. Its an ambiguity that plays out right to the final frame, where the only thing the audience can be sure of is that someone lost, someone won, but not whether its a good thing. In fact, there is nothing in this film that is what it appears to be as things play out in a color scheme of harsh industrial grays that underscore the shadowy goings on. Marcos straight-arrow officer gives way to view of where he lives, a train-wreck of an apartment, jammed with clutter and the ramen noodles on which he subsists along with the over-the-counter pills he takes to stay awake. Shaw detached, almost robotic, revealing more slowly the emotionally wrecked shell powerless against his programming and his mother, whose psycho-sexual reverse Oedipal longings are the stuff of their own nightmares. Washington and Schreiber both have a wondrous subtlety projecting mirror images disintegrating from the inside out, each playing strikingly similar moments, shedding one perfect tear without even realizing it, for example, in different ways that bring some real emotional heft to the story. There are also the disturbingly tight close-ups which make up the lions share of screen time. Close-ups where the subject as often as not is staring directly into the audience, mimicking the close scrutiny to which each of these characters subject each, looking for weakness, looking for help. The effect is dynamite, even when the story veers into the fantastic as it does once or twice, Demme and company keep things close enough to reality to let the film stay afloat. There are the constant glimpses of headlines, news crawls and the snatches of radio news reporting on a world on the brink of chaos with suicide bombers on American soil and Manchuria Global cleaning up on no-bid government contracts.
THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE is a taut thriller that stays true to its roots by tapping into the paranoia of its times, then and now. Whether Communism or multi-nationalism, the bottom line is the underlying, deep-seated fear that any perceived control we have over our own lives is an illusion jollied along by a cabal with no soul. Bone-chilling stuff, expertly executed.
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