The Manchurian Candidate is Still Powerful

 

 

 

 

The Manchurian Candidate (1962)

Produced and directed by John Frankenheimer

United Artists, 126 minutes, PG-13

In black and white

★★★★★

 

Most psychiatrists either do not believe in brainwashing or have declared it unproven. Yet, when heiress Patty Hearst was kidnapped (1974) and subsequently helped her captors rob banks, her counsel insisted she was a victim of Stockholm syndrome, in which an abused person comes to identify with her captors/abusers. You can make up your own mind about such things, but when The Manchurian Candidate came out (1962) mind control was indeed considered a real thing. The Cold War between the United States and the communist bloc was at a fever pitch. (The Berlin Wall was less than a year old.)

 

The Manchurian Candidate is a classic Cold War film from when President John F. Kennedy was in office, though George Axelrod’s script was based upon a 1959 novel from Richard Condon. Note that I said “novel.” Yet to audiences of its day it felt like a documentary, a belief enhanced by the use of melodramatic narration from Paul Frees. The movie’s depiction of North Korean, Chinese, and Soviet uses of brainwashing was taken so seriously that the CIA launched what is now a discredited program: MKUltra, the use of psychedelics (including LSD) to interrogate enemy captives.

 

The Manchurian Candidate is considered a film of such importance that it is preserved in the Library of Congress. If that doesn’t sway you, know that it’s considered an American classic and is indeed a very fine film. Stay with it, as the opening is bold and odd. A bunch of American GIs sit intently listening to a lecture on gardening. Huh? We only catch on when the women’s faces dissolve into those of Korean, Chinese, and Russian military personnel. We are actually witnessing a show trial of a different sort. An American platoon captured during the Korean War was brainwashed in China. As a demonstration of how effective it has been, Sgt. Raymond Shaw (Laurence Harvey) is shown a Queen of Diamonds and ordered to kill two of his men as victims and their peers sit passively.

 

As the film moves back to the United States, Shaw is hailed as a hero. Shaw is vaguely unsettled, but more by the fact that thinks his mother Eleanor (Angela Lansbury) and her fungible second husband, Senator John Iselin (James Gregory) are creeps. (The novel involved mother/son forced incest, a big no-no for a 1962 movie.) Also troubled is recently promoted Major Bennett Marco (Frank Sinatra) who has reoccurring dreams that Shaw was a hated squad leader who killed two of his own men. Another soldier has the same dreams and Marco is assigned to intelligence to investigate.

 

Shaw’s handlers prove to his American contacts that he is a controllable sleeper agent assassin by ordering Shaw to murder a newspaper editor critical of Senator Iselin, a rabid right-winger browbeaten by his wife Eleanor. She advises him, for instance, to claim that the Defense Department is riddled with communists. If that rings a bell, Iselin is clearly based upon infamous Senator Joseph McCarthy’s during the early 1950s. In the film, Shaw keeps tabs on Iselin’s liberal foe, Senator Thomas Jordan (John McGiver) and ingratiates himself to Jordan’s daughter Jocelyn (Leslie Parrish). While we’re at it, let’s assign a love interest for Major Marco, “Rosie” Cheyney (Janet Leigh). They first meet on a train and låater bails Marco out of jail for assaulting a Korean (Henry Silva!) he recognizes as an agent.

 

The Manchurian Candidate is terrifically acted, which more than compensates for situations we today might find overdone or implausible. Perhaps some of the names of the actors are unfamiliar to younger readers. In 1962, though, this was an all-star cast. Harvey was perhaps better known in Britain than in North America, but he was well cast for his icy, withdrawn demeanor. Lansbury was a veteran of stage, screen, and television–think Tony awards, Oscar nominations, Golden Globes, and Emmys–and Leigh had a distinguished movie career. She was the gal in the shower in Psycho and the mother of Jamie Lee Curtis. Could Sinatra act? He sure could. Even his mistakes were praised. (Watch for an out-of-focus scene in Manchurian Candidate used to show disorientation.)

 

Will Marco be able to stop Shaw? The Manchurian Candidate is a beat-the-clock thriller with sneaky motives, oily villains, and a shocking ending. Beware the Queen of Diamonds!

 

Rob Weir