Review of The Manchurian Candidate (2004) by Cory T — 13 Aug 2008

Political thrillers always seem to implode on the average American's life more than it should, considering the source of the received message and its intended reality. While this may remain fact, I will always maintain that they are not created to do much of anything else but create conversation, provoke thought, stir consideration. Did Paul Haggis not intend those same three things with his socially political, hotly racial view of Los Angeles in 2005?

One of the elements surrounding the 2004 version of "The Manchurian Candidate" is that America is radically different than she was 42 years ago when this story was originally told with Frank Sinatra in Denzel's character. Communism was being hounded and Kennedy was taking a fresh, strong stance against it, prompting Americans to feel safe and secure. Well, as history revealed, that story played out differently than was expected, but America continued its solid promise of Containment.

In 2004, the country was facing a new sort of communism: corporately; only now, communism was changed to flat-out terrorism. For what it's worth, Jonathan Demme does not try to retell the original story, but does utilize pieces of original material. Nor does he try to make realistic, political connections, but slyly insinuates everything he thinks the film should say.

"The Manchurian Candidate" takes the audience on a journey with a man who cannot trust his dreams, but equally so, he cannot deny their truth. ("Who can decide what they dream? ... And dream I do.") Denzel Washington is a good choice to play the tortured Army major, but it could also be argued he is well-suited to do about anything. The same is undeniably true about Meryl Streep, who can enstill icy villianry into the hearts of an entire room of people, silencing and persuading them in one breath. Liev Schreiber wanders around bewildered and entranced for most of the movie, enacting a sort of paranoid anxiousness that seems to be paradoxically applicable, if not a full-on metaphor. The movie is well-considered and crafted (One of the most critically overused phrases for, "it was okay.") but if I must admit to detractions they would certainly lie in the lengthy attention to details over... and over... and over again. I wouldn't necessarily say the film drug on, for most of the material is completely engrossing and disturbingly effective, but it becomes tediously overdeveloped very quickly, seeming to be waiting for the third act to approach for a change of scene.

Ultimately, the scariest notion of "The Manchurian Candidate" is not that we are not in control of our free nation and embracing democracy, but that our freedom is being corporately manipulated to mold and shape the power-hungry mongols that all-too-often sit on Capital Hill, gleaming with promises ("Securing tomorrow...today") but having their arms twisted behind their backs by the bullies with the checkbook.