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“The Manchurian Candidate” may be one of the sickest, sinister and most perverse political thrillers ever filmed which is why it is one of my all-time favorites. The film is about manipulation and mutation and how the deepest darkest side of human nature can be brought out and utilized by those who seek power if they know how to push the right buttons. Shot it glorious black and white, cast to pitch perfection and directed by the brilliant and meticulous John Frankenheimer this is one of the smartest movies to ever come out of Hollywood. And shame on the AFI for having the arrogance to remove it from their 100 Greatest Movies of all time.
It’s fascinating how a black and white film can pay such attention to color and here that color is red. In the first scene after the opening credits we see a platoon of soldiers sitting at a garden party in what they think is an east coast American hotel. The flower that keeps being talked about is hydrangeas. Now for you horticulturalists out there you probably know that the color of the blossoms of hydrangeas depends on the soil in which they are grown except for ones that are pure white to begin with which remain pure white. If the soil is rich in acid and the hydrangeas are well nourished the blossoms will be blue. But if the hydrangea plant is not nurtured and the soil does not have the proper amount of acid in it the blossoms will turn pink…or in this case “red”. The analogy being drawn here is that the maternal love in Staff Sergeant Raymond Shaw’s childhood was undernourished and therefore the communists are able to use his unfulfilled need to bend him to their will and thus he turns red.
If you listen to the Director’s Commentary by John Frankenheimer which I strongly suggest, he talks about how they had to shoot the scene six different ways in order to get the surreal dreamlike quality they wanted to achieve. The set was built on a train track so it could turn it around in a circle. They actors playing the soldiers literally had to do their scene, get up and run a hundred and eighty degrees to the opposite side and sit back down to play the scene a different way. Ironically many of the other scenes in the film were done in a single shot and some on the first take.
Continuing with the color red the trigger card in the deck that allows the communists to manipulate Raymond when they ask him to play solitaire is the Red Queen or queen of diamonds (in a French deck the Queen of Diamonds represents Rachel from the Bible whom Jacob falls in love with). Richard Condon may have chosen this card as a reference to Lewis Carol’s “Through the Looking Glass”. Lewis himself referred to the Red Queen (as opposed to the Queen of Hearts) as being a type of fury but unlike the Queen of Hearts “her passion must be cold and calm” and Lewis felt the Red Queen must be “pedantic” paying strict attention to details…and does she ever. The red queen represents Raymond’s mother who is indeed cold and calm and not at all a nurturing parent.
Raymond’s mother’s name is Eleanor which means “other, foreign” and was historically given to women of nobility. Ironically it is also thought to mean “compassion”. His mother and stepfather’s last name, Iselin means “iron” and may be a sly reference to the iron curtain. The name Shaw means “dweller by the wood” thus her name can be thought of as “Foreign Iron Dweller by the Wood” or possibly to be ironic “Compassionate Iron Dweller by the Wood”. Raymond’s name means “Protecting Hands” or with Shaw added “Protecting Hands Dweller by the Wood” therefore we can think of it as the Protecting Hands against the Foreign Iron. One of the most loaded lines in the script in reference to Raymond’s relationship to his mother is at the top of the movie and comes from Private Bobby Lembeck who says innocently of Raymond’s not liking the whore house, “Maybe he has a girl back home”.
Lincoln is used throughout the film to represent Senator Iselin also for ironic effect. In the rooms his scenes take place pictures of Lincoln can be found as well as a bust. He dresses as Lincoln for the costume party and he desecrates an American Flag made from caviar. Also Mrs. Iselin is dressed as Bo Peep (she is also dressed this way in the book in the same scene) and in a great exchange with Senator Thomas Jordan who is the father of Jocelyn Jordan, the woman Raymond is in love with he tells Eleanor he will block her from getting her husband nominated with every last penny he has and every last cent (note that Lincoln is on the American penny) he can borrow. Eleanor throws down her hook with cold and controlled disdain and in that moment we know that the worst is coming. I might also add in reference to her costume that “to play Bo Peep” is an archaic term which means to be tied to a whipping pole.
Further playing on the theme of mutation is the scene where Ben meets Eugenie on the train.
She first introduces herself as Eugenie but as the scene progresses she reveals to him her friends call her “Rosie”. We find out late in the scene Eugenie’s full name is Eugenie Rose with Rose being the name she chooses because it, in her opinion, sounds strong. The name “Eugenie” means “well born” and “good”. The name Rosie just like the Red Queen and the hydrangeas also represents the color red. And as a rose is a flower we are also drawn back to the scene about the hydrangeas. Rosie, very much the opposite of Mrs. Iselin and has a certain maternal instinct about her we see in her relationship with Ben Marco and the scene shows that though Raymond’s mother may be what Raymond calls “a terrible, terrible woman” Rosie is the opposite. The scene works on multiple levels and not just to allow for the two characters to meet. Because the conversation between them is about their names (for instance Major Marco’s name is Ben derived from Benet and he is named after an officer Benet) and the different titles people address them by we see it is another way the film plays on the theme of mutation. Their names and in a sense their identities mutate throughout the course of the scene paralleling with the mutation which had taken place in Raymond. It is also a reference to the audience and the way our own identity is shaped by other people. John Frankenheimer in the director’s commentary talks about how the dialogue here is strange and perhaps on first viewing it is. But upon multiple viewings it is a brilliant and logical choice by Condon as a way to continue to weave the thread of his theme through the story.
One of the most crucial scenes in the film is between Major Marco and Jocelyn Jordan which again plays on the theme of mutation. Jocelyn is a pretty but naïve young woman who is in love with Raymond and does not want to believe he is mentally ill and capable of the worst. The scene shows how naiveté and innocence have no place in the world of politics. Her inability to believe Raymond can appear to be one thing but manipulated to act as another makes her blind to the manipulation of the world. She is incapable of understanding the fact that if she has been molded to act lovingly by her father that it is equally logical that Raymond has been molded to act violently by his mother. And her attempt to convince Marco she is right about Raymond’s innocence has dire effects.
One interesting factoid about the film is Angela Lansbury in her Oscar nominated finest role ever playing Raymond’s mother Mrs. Eleanor Shaw Iselin was only two years older than Lawrence Harvey at the time. On the Director’s Commentary Frankenheimer talks about how Frank Sinatra’s first choice for the part was Lucile Ball but Frankenheimer wanted Lansbury for the part and showed Sinatra his previous film “All Fall Down” where Lansbury played Warren Beatty’s mother. Sinatra graciously agreed to have them Angela Lansbury cast after seeing her performance. One interesting reason for Lansbury playing the part so convincingly may not only be because she is a talented actress but in real life is a rare personality type called an INTJ (in fact the rarest personality type amongst women). INTJs look at the world as a giant chessboard and are known for their intellectualism, strategic capabilities, pragmatic scientific approach to all things, extraordinary imaginations and as a downfall their cold aloof personalities and remedial social skills all of which fit the character of Mrs. Iselin very well. Also they are capable of caring very deeply for a select few which works brilliantly in one of the crucial scenes between Raymond and Mrs. Mrs. Eleanor Shaw Iselin. Frankenheimer says in the same scene in the book Eleanor seduces and beds Raymond. But in the film we only get a brief glimpse of the possibility due to the limitations of the movie code at the time.
Other interesting factoids include the following: the karate fight in the film between Major Marco and Chunjin is supposed to be the first one ever filmed in Hollywood. When the crew filmed in New York and Raymond walks into the water it was freezing cold and a foot of ice on the surface which had to be removed early the morning of shooting in order for him to walk into the water which Lawrence Harvey did without flinching. The names Major Marco reads from the book are real soldiers who are actually in The Congressional Medal of Honor Book and performed the acts of bravery stated. Frankenheimer used the card costume used on Jocelyn two years earlier in a television production of “The Snows of Kilimanjaro”.
John Frankenheimer and George Axlerod wisely stuck very close to Richard Condon’s book when crafting the script and in doing so created a masterpiece. It is one of the must see films of all time, riveting, insightful and daring taking its place amongst Hollywood’s very best.
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| Additional DVD options | Edition | Discs | Price | New from | Used from |
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July 13, 2004 "Please retry" | Special Edition | 1 | $4.50 | $2.04 |
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July 31, 2017 "Please retry" | — | 1 | $14.40 | $15.26 |
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