The Manchurian Candidate (2004 film)

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The Manchurian Candidate
The Manchurian Candidate Theactrical Poster
Directed by	Jonathan Demme
Produced by	Jonathan Demme Ilona Herzberg Scott Rudin
Written by	-Novel- Richard Condon -Screenplay- Daniel Pyne Dean Georgaris
Starring	Denzel Washington Meryl Streep Liev Schreiber Jeffrey Wright Jon Voight
Music by	Rachel Portman
Cinematography	Tak Fujimoto
Editing by	Carol Littleton Craig McKay
Distributed by	-USA- Paramount Pictures -non USA- UIP
Release date(s)	July 30, 2004
Running time	129 minutes
Language	English
Budget	80 million USD
IMDb profile

The Manchurian Candidate is a 2004 American film based on the 1959 novel The Manchurian Candidate by Richard Condon, and a reimagining of the previous 1962 film. The film stars Denzel Washington as Ben Marco, a tenacious, virtuous soldier, Liev Schreiber as Raymond Shaw, a U.S. Congressman, manipulated into becoming a vice-presidential candidate, Jon Voight as Tom Jordan, a U.S. Senator and challenger for vice-president, and Meryl Streep as Eleanor Shaw, a villainous senator and mother of Raymond Shaw.

Tagline: Everything is under control.

1 Plot
2 Featured Cast
3 Awards and Nominations
4 External links

[edit] Plot

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

While the plot still centers on a candidate brainwashed with the involvement of his mother and her own political aims, the mechanics of the story and the parties involved are quite different in cases.

The movie has Shaw (Schreiber) himself as the vice-presidential candidate; Marco (Washington), also brainwashed but not fully aware of it, as the assassin; Eleanor Shaw (Streep), as a power-hungry and ruthless politician. The film attempts to adapt itself to the modern world by having the brainwashing conducted by Manchurian Global, a large multinational corporation and government contractor (widely assumed to be comparable with the real world global private equity firm, the Carlyle Group, or sometimes the oil and military services contractor, Halliburton), with the aim of expanding corporate influence as well as government contracts for themselves. Instead of capture during the Korean War, and being brainwashed by communists, Marco and Shaw's unit is captured during the first Gulf War (Desert Storm), and brainwashed at a secret Manchurian Global facility. The film also plays on the issues of the 2004 presidential campaign (it was released that same year), such as the War on Terror.

The incredibly friendly first meeting between Eugenie (named Rosie in this movie) and Marco is retained almost verbatim, and made realistic when it is discovered that she is an FBI agent assigned to monitor him. It is Rosie who then discovers Marco after the altered assassination (who kills Shaw, having just won the election, as opposed to the original where the assassination takes place just before a candidacy declaration). Unlike the original, where Shaw commits suicide after killing Iselin, the assassin (Marco) is subdued before he can do so.

After hospitalization and conditioning, Marco helps the feds locate the abandoned island facility where he and his unit were brainwashed. In the original version, the question of whether the Communists' brainwashing technology could be used again is never addressed, and they simply disappear from the story.

The motives behind the brainwashed assassination plot in the 2004 version are more straightforward than the collusive politics of the original version: a corporation desires increased influence over government, so brainwashes a candidate who can be made pliable to their wishes.

[edit] Featured Cast

Actor	Role
Denzel Washington	Ben Marco
Liev Schreiber	Congressman Raymond Shaw
Meryl Streep	Senator Eleanor Shaw
Jon Voight	Senator Thomas Jordan
Kimberly Elise	Rosie
Vera Farmiga	Jocelyne Jordan
Ted Levine	Colonel Howard
Miguel Ferrer	Colonel Garret
Dean Stockwell	Mark Whiting
Jeffrey Wright	Al Melvin
Simon McBurney	Atticus Noyle
Tom Stechschulte	Governer Robert Arthur
Obba Babatunde	Senator Wells
John Aprea	Rear Admiral Glick
Roger Corman	Mr. Secretary
Al Franken	TV Commentator
Bruno Ganz	Delp
Robyn Hitchcock	Laurent Tokar
Bill Irwin	Scoutmaster
Adam LeFevre	Congressman Healy
Charles Napier	General Sloan
Tracey Walter	Night Clerk