The Manchurian Candidate | Page 2 | Golden Skate

The Manchurian Candidate

heyang

Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
Haven't seen the new one, yet - but the original was on PBS last night. Angela Lansbury and Frank Sinatra gave excellent performances. Can't remember the name of the actor who portrayed the Candidate, but he was excellent, too.

I can see why this considered a great film.
 

show 42

Arm Chair Skate Fan
Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
I haven't seen the original yet, but I found a copy on Amazon.com and sent for it. As to the remake, I think what happened is a company of soldiers was captured (by the government or corporate America, whichever is the scariest) with the sole purpose of brainwashing. Implants were injected into their brains and underneath their skins. They were now "human robotoids" so to speak and carried out direct orders, (they were tested by being ordered to kill their own platoon buddies). One of these soldiers was being groomed for the white house, so it had to be believed that he was a hero with the Congressional Medal of Honor........he makes it as far as the vice-presidency, and Denzel is programed to kill the President elect so the VP with the implant will be the first "puppet president" controlled by a corporation called the "Manchurian Group", hence the name "Manchurian Candidate". It backfires and Denzel shoots and kills the VP and "Mommy Dearest" as well. I am guessing Denzel gets reprogrammed in the end..........42
 
Joined
Jul 11, 2003
just saw the remake and the two are comparable. Frankeheimer and Demme both directed well. Acting was great in both films, Story much clearer at the end of the original; not so, for me, in the remake. Why an incestuous mother would get her son involved in assasination plot for the sake of a budding company is unbelieveable. The faux communist threat was much more believeable. The black and white caught the McCarthesque character perfectly as it did for the others in the cast. The color in the remake takes away the sinister goings on, and the remake is full of hi tech whereas the original was more like it was.

And like many films today, the extreme dolby sound actually takes me away from the action.

Rent the Original and yes, Lawrence Harvey was special in those days.

Joe
 

Vash01

Medalist
Joined
Jul 31, 2003
Spoilers....

show 42 said:
I haven't seen the original yet, but I found a copy on Amazon.com and sent for it. As to the remake, I think what happened is a company of soldiers was captured (by the government or corporate America, whichever is the scariest) with the sole purpose of brainwashing. Implants were injected into their brains and underneath their skins. They were now "human robotoids" so to speak and carried out direct orders, (they were tested by being ordered to kill their own platoon buddies). One of these soldiers was being groomed for the white house, so it had to be believed that he was a hero with the Congressional Medal of Honor........he makes it as far as the vice-presidency, and Denzel is programed to kill the President elect so the VP with the implant will be the first "puppet president" controlled by a corporation called the "Manchurian Group", hence the name "Manchurian Candidate". It backfires and Denzel shoots and kills the VP and "Mommy Dearest" as well. I am guessing Denzel gets reprogrammed in the end..........42

I understood all of that. The confusion is about exactly what happened at the end and how......................

....SPOILERS ahead....please do NOT read if you want to see this movie....

There are different opinions about this, and different possibilities depending on how you interpret the details of what happened- for example- Shaw moves away from the star on the floor, whether he intentionally let Marco kill him and his mother, did the eye contact between Shaw & Marco mean anything? Were they both acting on programming, or just one of them? Did they act using the deeper mind that Marco mentioned in their meeting? Did Shaw stand on the star too long or not long enough? Was Marco instructed to shoot Shaw or the President? Some think he was programmed to shoot Shaw but Shaw was programmed to move out of the way so that the president would get shot. Why did Shaw want to get killed (that is, if he intentionally signaled to Marco). There are endless possibilities. Also Marco was programmed to kill himself after killing the president but Rosie got there in time and she shot his arm/shoulder. I was also not clear how Marco's pic on the security tape got superimposed with a different one. The only sure thing is that the chip in Marco's brain was surgically removed at the end, hence the shaven head. The washing away of the picture meant letting go of the painful past and moving on, for Marco.

............................

END of SPOILERS...................................................

Sounds like the movie is actually interesting. I will certainly rent the DVD to study it in detail.

Vash
 

show 42

Arm Chair Skate Fan
Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
...........Why don't they make "Cliff Notes for movies?" :) My understanding is that Shaw purposely put himself in harms way, and pulled his mother in close so that they would both be killed by the bullet. Shaw seems to be in somewhat more control than Marco at that point. I felt that Shaw was looking up to where Marco was positioned waiting for him to pull the trigger. I didn't feel Marco was making eye contact back, just hesitating while he got a clear shot of the President elect. Shaw kept getting himself out of position. Apparantly, some part of his brain that controlled his free-will was getting through and he wanted to end the sickening charade that his life had become and "Mommy"s as well.............just my take on it of course.....

The Feds apparantly cropped the video tape picture with a known international fugitive in order to protect Marco and absolve him from any wrong doing.......I guess they felt they had to salvage someone from the covert operation.....42
 
Joined
Jul 11, 2003
There was no such loose ends in the original and you must get a copy of it. Now that you've seen the remake the original ending won't be as shocking but it will be clear. There's no color in this version. The black and white shadows makes it very spooky. It's Shaw who is programmed to kill the president nominee, and his mother is sitting with his step father who is to be nominated as the vice-president. Marco spots Shaw from the floor and rushes up to stop him.

In the remake I was confused too with the ending. as far as Marco was concerned. I saw him being shot by the Fed girlfriend and then he reappears with an arm in a sling. Didn't get that.

Joe
 

BronzeisGolden

Medalist
Joined
Jul 27, 2003
*****SPOILER*****

Joe,

Marco was about to shoot himself when the Fed girlfriend walked in...she shot him in the shoulder in order to "save" him in a sense.
 
Joined
Jul 11, 2003
Broze - Ah, that makes some sense. In the original there is a suicide but not Marco,. There were no implants in the original. It was just olf fashion brain washing.

Joe
 

show 42

Arm Chair Skate Fan
Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
Received my copy of the original "Manchurian Candidate" from Amazon last week and finished the movie the other day. I must say that I am impressed. This version completely kept the viewer abreast of "why and when" as the story went along. I am wondering why the remake's ending was very much different from the original. The dream sequence at the beginning with the ladies at the flower club meeting was brilliant..........I was surprised to see that both "moms" were given that extra touch of "evil" by giving their sons "lingering" kisses near the end of the movie........not a big deal in 2004, but must have created a stir when it was originally filmed in the 50's..........I still like the remake, though, but the Sinatra, Harvey flick is a must see..........42
 

Vash01

Medalist
Joined
Jul 31, 2003
I can't even rent a video here. It is always out. It must be the most popular movie right now (the 1962 version, of course). I will try my luck again this weekend.
 
Last edited:

RealtorGal

Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 27, 2003
Just got back from seeing this film--we absolutely loved it! We're looking forward to renting the original. I thought that the ending was perfectly clear. Marco told Shaw that there was a connection deep down between them and that no one could take that away. That is why Shaw refused to press charges against Marco. Shaw saw his opportunity to free himself so he signalled Marco, pulling his mother in tight so they'd both get killed. It was the only way for him to end his suffering and misery and to stop the enemy, which was in part, as he told Shaw, himself. He didn't know how to stop it all otherwise, and, as he said, "Marco is an excellent marksman." He knew he would not miss.

Rosie shot him in the shoulder to prevent him from committing suicide, which no doubt had been Mommy Dearest's instructions to him. He was deprogrammed, implants extracted and studied then brought to the island for closure. All evidence of what transpired on that island looks to have been destroyed. Nevertheless, the Manchurian connection was exposed, as we saw by the news report at the end.

There was an important twist that would have been easy to overlook: Towards the end, we hear a news report in the background saying how the Manchurian Corporation would be sponsoring its own troops to "relieve" U.S. forces. Guess they had more plans in mind. These would have been civilian yet company-owned forces supposedly acting on behalf of the U.S. government.
 
Top