Sure, you may have heard of Frank Sinatra starring in movies, but have you seen him do an action-fight scene? "Ol' Blue Eyes" may be best known as the singer, but he's an outstanding actor, too.
The Red Scare and McCarthyism are byproducts of the Cold War, and they've been the subject of numerous Hollywood films.
The Manchurian Candidate is a fictional political thriller from 1962 based on the novel of the same title. An American patrol is captured during the Korean War, and years after the war, surviving members are still experiencing the same recurring nightmare. The patrol leader, played by Sinatra, is trying to unravel the mystery behind the brainwashing and sleeper agent.
The Manchurian Candidate was directed by John Frankenheimer, who actually served in the Korean War, and the cast includes Laurence Harvey, Angela Lansbury, and Janet Leigh, a couple of years after she did Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho.
There's a 2004 remake of The Manchurian Candidate with Denzel Washington, Liev Schreiber, and Meryl Streep, but it's not as faithful to the novel, and I much more prefer the 1962 film adaptation.
While the idea of "brainwashing" someone to kill somebody and not having any memory of it may seem implausible, experimentations with mind control for tactical purposes has been historically documented.
The Manchurian Candidate is a classic that hardly ever gets mentioned, but the politics in the film is as relatable today as it was in the 1950s and '60s.
Interestingly, Angela Lansbury played the mother of Lawrence Harvey's character in The Manchurian Candidate, but she was only three years older than he was.
Lansbury's performance in The Manchurian Candidat earned her another Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. While she didn't win the Oscar, the British native has won several other awards and almost became an EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony) winner. What a multi-talented lady indeed.
May she rest in peace.
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