The Manchurian Candidate (1962)

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The Manchurian Candidate (1962) – J. Frankenheimer

I think it was probably 1990 or so when Bill, Marc, and I all travelled to Chicago (from our separate locales) to visit Laura.  There was a Jackie Chan film festival at the Art Institute (this is how I remember it) and we planned to see something – but, somehow, we turned up on the wrong night and The Manchurian Candidate was showing after having been out of circulation for decades.  What a thrill to see something this weird with no foreknowledge!  Frank Sinatra stars as Major Ben Marco who, as the film opens, is captured with his platoon by Chinese troops in the Korean war.  In a tour-de-force scene (staged by director John Frankenheimer), we learn that they have been brainwashed into believing that they are waiting out a storm at a women’s garden club meeting in New Jersey when in fact they are exhibits of psychological conditioning being shown to Chinese and Russian brass.  Laurence Harvey plays Staff Sgt. Raymond Shaw who is conditioned to be an assassin and set to be turned over to his American operator upon his return to New York. Being asked to play solitaire –and the presence of a particular card -- are the cues that open him up to external control. When Marco starts having vivid nightmares about his time in Korea, he begins an investigation that will ultimately lead to the truth.  Angela Lansbury plays Shaw’s mother, a rabid anti-communist working through her buffoon husband (Barney Miller’s James Gregory) who is a McCarthyite senator. Janet Leigh plays Sinatra’s love interest – or is she a double agent? Their dialogue together is nonsensical at best.  The plot has a number of twists and turns, which I won’t reveal here.  (I refuse to watch the remake).  This is one of the all-time great Cold War thrillers – if you haven’t seen it, you should.