The Manchurian Candidate

The Manchurian Candidate was filmed in 2004 as a remake of the original film from 1962. Denzel Washington stars as the veteran Ben Marco. Liev Shreiber stars as Raymond Prentiss Shaw who served in the army unit with Denzel's character and won the congressional medal of honor for supposedly saving his troop. Shaw is the nominee for VP of the United States due to the pushy political nature of his mother, Eleanor Prentiss Shaw (Meryl). Meryl Streep and Liev Schreiber appear to portray a typical mother-child relationship consisting of an extremely controlling and overly involved mother who is attempting to control the career decisions of her child. However, as the movie progresses, Marco begins to have "dreams" that unveil some of the secret occurrences from Kuwait. It turns out that Eleanor has literally been paying a neuroscientist to "get inside of her son's brain" in order to manipulate his decisions and control his will. Marco makes several attempts to contact Shaw and is accused of being crazy. Eventually, after Eleanor has brainwashed her son into killing their competition and has attempted to brainwash Denzel into killing the President-elect, Marco ends up shooting Shaw and his mother on election night.

Meryl plays quite an evil character in this film. She's quite horrific in her hunger for power, but she also embodies the qualities of the stereotypical politician with her ability to convince her political party that she knows what is best for the country. They listen to her because of her authority and unwillingness to give in, rather than her actual knowledge of the country's situation. She is not only a manipulative mother, but a deceptive politician. This film seems so preposterous, but perhaps it's not. There are certainly politicians that appear to be controlled by a source other than themselves (Schreiber); or politicians that appear to have a hunger to control the people of a nation (Streep). It's interesting that even in Streep's conniving role as a mother, the viewer can't help but be attracted to her persistence and charisma as a political figure. It makes you wonder about the charismatic, controlling, persuasive nature of several political figures in office today.

School, Life, Characters, and Meryl

I am a 23-year old graduate student in Memphis, TN. I've never written a blog before; truthfully, I found the whole premise somewhat strange at first. I spend a lot of my time studying my way through graduate school. I really like to write (although, I don't typically enjoy reading as much) and when I can take a few minutes to myself - I really enjoy watching films. I enjoy almost all genres of movies, except for some of the science fiction, which I can not quite throw myself into.
Throughout the last year, I've become very fond of Meryl Streep's movies. I've found myself connecting to the women she portrays in almost every film. Ironically, when I watched Julie and Julia last year and Amy Adam's character describes the connection she feels with Julia Child - it reminded me of the connection I often feel with these characters. For example, the mother-daughter relationship in Mamma Mia, the mother-daughter relationship in It's complicated, the relationship between Julie Powell and her husband in Julie & Julia, the confusion of balancing a family and a life that Joanna faces in Kramer vs. Kramer, and even the political concern and involvement as the TV journalist in Lions for lambs. These films are my outlet from school, stress, and life - but, I feel as though I'm living through them with her.
So, a long story short...I have decided to blog my way through Meryl Streep's movies - perhaps this was even inspired by one of her films: Julie & Julia. I hope that you will accompany me - if there's anyone reading this. I will likely not be going in a predictable order, but I'll conclude each blog with which one is next. Hopefully, some of you can watch, comment, and enjoy them with me.
Here goes....up next: The Manchurian Candidate.