A hard and hated sergeant saves his troops in Korea and returns a Medal of Honor recipient being praised by his men as "the bravest, finest, most lovable man I ever met." Soon, a major he rescued has a recurring haunted dream and he soon pieces together the he and the rest of the unit were victims of brainwashing, with the Soviets pulling the strings, and all of it is entangled with the sergeant's mother and her senator husband's bid for the Vice Presidential nominations. "The Manchurian Candidate" is dark, taut, and tense exercise and one of the best psychological thrillers ever constructed. From a Richard Condon novel, John Frankenheimer directs with precision and casts a feeling of eerie dread around the entire production. The cast is uniformly excellent with Frank Sinatra giving one of his finest turns as the troubled major, Laurence Harvey pitch perfect and haunting as the major, and Angela Lansbury harrowing playing one of the great villainesses in movie history. "The Manchurian Candidate" is incredible filmmaking, that would have not only been shocking to a 1962 audience but also to today's.
