For our next entry in the 44 Days of Paranoia, we take a look at the 2004 remake of The Manchurian Candidate.  (You can read my review of the original by clicking on this sentence.)

During the first Gulf War, when a platoon of soldiers is attacked by Iraqi forces, their lives are saved by Sgt. Raymond Shaw (Liev Schrieber).  Raymond receives the congressional medal of honor and is eventually elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.  In many ways, Shaw is continuing the family business.  Not only was his father a Senator but so is his powerful and calculating mother (Meryl Streep).  As the film opens, Raymond Shaw has just been nominated for the vice presidency.  A strife-torn America looks to Shaw to save the country.  After all, he’s a war hero.

Or is he?

Major Ben Marco (Denzel Washington), who was a member of Shaw’s platoon, has spent the last few years having nightmares in which he and the other members of the platoon — including Shaw — were captured, brainwashed, and had implants inserted into their bodies.  When Marco discovers that the other members of his platoon have been having the exact same nightmare, he starts to investigate on his own.

When I first started watching this version of The Manchurian Candidate, my initial response was to go, “Bleh!  Remake!”  There’s a reason why most film bloggers automatically despise any and all remakes.  Usually, they add little to the original version and they rarely improve over what was previously there.  Even worse, remakes often times seem to be directed by some of the worst hacks in Hollywood.  What’s more insulting — to have your movie remade or to have it remade by Brett Ratner?

However, Jonathan Demme is not your typical Hollywood hack and that became quickly obvious as I watched his remake of The Manchurian Candidate.  Both Demme’s direction and the screenplay by Daniel Pine and Dean Georgaris show a lot of respect for the original while also providing a few surprises of their own.  Demme creates a convincing portrait of a society that has been consumed by secrecy and is now running the risk of collapsing under the weight of conspiracy.

Unfortunately, the remake doesn’t quite capture the satiric bite of the original.  One of the things that made the original Manchurian Candidate so memorable was the fact that both sides of the ideological divide were ultimately portrayed as being empty, shallow, and ultimately destructive.  The ultimate message was that neither the left nor the right should be trusted.  The remake is a lot more specific about who the villains are and what they believe in and, as a result, its attempts at social and political commentary are a lot more predictable.  The original Manchurian Candidate could both entertain you and make you think.  The remake is very entertaining but never quite thought-provoking.

While it can’t hope to improve on the original, the remake of The Manchurian Candidate is a well-made and compelling action film that features a trio of great performances from Denzel Washington, Liev Schrieber, and especially Meryl Streep.  As her performance here shows, Meryl really should be playing more villains because her performance here is not only impressive but also fun to watch.

Other Entries In The 44 Days of Paranoia 

1. Clonus
2. Executive Action
3. Winter Kills
4. Interview With The Assassin
5. The Trial of Lee Harvey Oswald
6. JFK
7. Beyond The Doors
8. Three Days of the Condor
9. They Saved Hitler’s Brain
10. The Intruder
11. Police, Adjective
12. Burn After Reading
13. Quiz Show
14. Flying Blind
15. God Told Me To
16. Wag the Dog
17. Cheaters
18. Scream and Scream Again
19. Capricorn One
20. Seven Days In May
21. Broken City
22. Suddenly
23. Pickup on South Street
24. The Informer
25. Chinatown
26. Compliance
27. The Lives of Others
28. The Departed
29. A Face In The Crowd
30. Nixon
31. The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
32. The Purge
33. The Stepford Wives
34. Saboteur
35. A Dark Truth
36. The Fugitive
37. The Day of Jackal
38. Z
39. The Fury
40. The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
41. Shattered Glass