They've done a great job of updating the Cold War paranoid classic "The Manchurian Candidate."

Set against a day-after-tomorrow war on terrorism backdrop, Jonathan Demme's remake of John Frankenheimer's 1962 thriller substitutes Manchurian Global, a Halliburton/Carlyle Groupish multinational monster, for sinister Communist conspirators. Instead of a brainwashed Korean War hero hypnotized to assassinate top U.S. officials, now we've got electronically controlled Gulf War medal winners aiming to be implanted in the highest office in the land. Angela Lansbury's power-mad mother is now Meryl Streep's power-mad, ice (chomping) blond senator; hmm, wonder which former first lady she's based on.

And even though it follows the basic plot lines of Richard Condon's novel and George Axelrod's '60s screenplay, Daniel Pyne and Dean Georgaris' new script seems to have been revised through the headlines of the past six months. Everything from manipulation of electronic voting machines to meal providers price-gouging our troops in, um, Indonesia is registered over an incessant background media babble. On a note of chilling prophesy, terrorist attacks in America seem to have become so commonplace that no one pays much attention to reports of them. It all contributes to an oppressive atmosphere of ruthlessness and dread.

Demme has even gotten more wounded, arguably better performances out of his three leads - Denzel Washington, Liev Schreiber and Streep - than Frankenheimer drew from Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey and Lansbury.

Yet the new film still suffers from the overcalculated slickness that kept the original just this side of greatness. Maybe a story so steeped in dehumanization and manipulation just can't help coming off cold, regardless of how many hot buttons it pushes.

Once again exploring behaviors we've never seen him address before, Washington surprises us with his vulnerable, deeply damaged take on Bennett Marco, the Army major who can't quite recall what happened to his unit during a Kuwait ambush more than a decade ago. His determination to get to the bottom of it - and how it might affect a crucial presidential election - exhibits the rare bravery of a very confused man who is well aware that he may be off-base but must muster the strength to convince himself that he can't be entirely wrong.As Bennett's even more schized-out former sergeant and current vice-presidential nominee Raymond Shaw, reliable supporting player Schreiber gives a star-quality performance. His pirouettes between robotic evil, impudent rebelliousness and Shaw's own poignant need to know the truth are as graceful as they are persuasive.And they were lucky to get Streep to play the candidate's mom. I can't imagine any other actress pulling off Sen. Eleanor Shaw's over-the-top, monomaniacal monologues without turning her into a complete cartoon. Streep can't exactly bring reality to a role that's been conceived with absolutely none, but at least she can signal to an audience that she's having a great time with it, and therefore we should, too.As for Demme, he may not have returned to his own Gulf War-era, "Silence of the Lambs" heyday. But "Manchurian" is a darn sight better than the director's last '60s remake, "The Truth About Charlie." And like Demme's previous Washington starrer, "Philadelphia," it's got something to say - and says it well.