The Manchurian Candidate has been well noted as a top-notch thriller and dark political satire and one of Frank Sinatra’s most enduring performances. It also deals in multi-faceted ways with the theme of memory. Never mind the fantastical brainwashing, Laurence Harvey’s Raymond Shaw is a character haunted by memories; a controlling mother, a lost love, false memories, and memories repressed. As the film plays out, it is the interaction with these forms of memory that drives the story to one of the most dramatic conclusions in film history.
—Darryl A. Armstrong