wes-connors Handsomely reckless sportsman Rock Hudson (as Robert "Bob" Merrick) crashes his speedboat and survives, miraculously unscratched. However, Mr. Hudson's medical treatment inadvertently contributes to the death of a beloved doctor. It doesn't seem fair that a hero (Dr. Phillips) dies while a heel (Mr. Hudson) is saved. The good doctor's widow Jane Wyman (as Helen) becomes acquainted with Hudson and rejects his amorous advances. Hudson decides to change his ways by secretly doing good deeds. Despite his handsomeness and wealth, Ms. Wyman continues to spurn Hudson. His "Magnificent Obsession" with Wyman leads Hudson to make another tragic event occur, but love could eventually conquer all...Producer Ross Hunter delivered the goods and director Douglas Sirk turned some silly soap operas into high cinematic art. With this one, Mr. Sirk is very much like a painter, brushing light and shadows across the screen. Watching the movement of characters and cameras will reveal additional brush strokes. The characters are always doing something. Nobody has to just stand there and say their lines, which is nice for those on both sides of the screen. It's all so smooth, even when Hudson drunkenly holds up the "DANGER" sign for the wide screen camera before bonding with philosophical pipe-holder Otto Kruger (as Edward "Ed" Randolph). And, it's pleasingly ludicrous, although the final quarter is a bit less artful.******** Magnificent Obsession (4/20/54) Douglas Sirk ~ Jane Wyman, Rock Hudson, Barbara Rush, Agnes Moorehead

Armand an old story. using not new themes. but beautiful for the good science to explore and use elements for common melodrama. and the basic virtue is science for choose the right cast.and for the charm of gentle performance who preserves the flavor of romance but transforms a classic romance in a not bad lesson about noble purpose of life. a film who seduce. for the acting as ladder to a different manner for present the story and its pieces. sure, Rock Hudson is master for translate his character metamorphose, Otto Kruger - ideal guru and Jane Wyman gives grace, force and precision to her role. but that is only a way. the viewer seems see a different by a long and powerful tradition. and that is really important.

Holdjerhorses "Magnificent Obsession" is Douglas Sirk's rehearsal for "All That Heaven Allows" and "Imitation of Life." The story (from Lloyd Douglas' novel) is a ludicrous drug-store romance with a smarmy tinge of Woolworth spirituality that DARES you not to take all this seriously.Through a series of unintentionally tragi-comic coincidences, Rock Hudson gamely goes from rich bad selfish playboy to -- what else? -- selfless neurosurgeon who saves the sight and life of the comatose woman he loves, eight years his senior.Oh, for the days when doctors and patients offered each other cigarettes in their offices: When even small out-of-the-way hospitals out West were staffed with full orchestras and choirs stationed just outside OR.The actors are fine. Particularly Wyman and Moorehead, who somehow make their impossible lines sound genuine. Sirk's direction, design and cinematography are, as usual, outstanding. But the script is insurmountable.One tries and tries to go with the implied emotions of these contrived situations, but succumbs to chuckling disbelief with every ham-handed twist.Thankfully, all was redeemed just one year later, when the major players returned in the superlative, "All That Heaven Allows." Followed, four years after THAT, by Sirk's incomparable masterpiece of the genre, "Imitation of Life."

bobsgrock Douglas Sirk is often praised some 50 years after his career ended for being one of the most subversive and bittersweet of Hollywood directors of the 1950s. Born in Germany, he began his film career in the German cinema, only to flee when the Nazis took control. By the mid 1940s, he was a full-fledged Hollywood director assigned by studios to churn out as many films as possible. However, even after all these years, it is clear that like fellow immigrant directors Billy Wilder and Ernst Lubitsch, there was a dark undertone in all of Sirk's works that continues to amaze today.The first of Sirk's most well-known films was Magnificent Obsession, a glossy Technicolor melodrama that on the surface appears to be as soapy and exploitative as any daytime television drama. However, many critics and scholars in recent years have instructed us to look closer, to try and understand the hidden meanings and undertones of such a story. Clearly, it is obvious that Sirk used such a decor and platform as that was what he was given to work with. Melodramas were becoming quite popular in the 1950s, this itself being a reflection of the growing artifice and superficial decadence that would come to characterize postwar America. Sirk, being a European immigrant, would know and recognize this better than almost anyone. Therefore, he brilliantly used American settings, characterizations and story lines to subject to American audiences the very ideas and social graces he saw through. Just as expected, people fell for the bait and came in droves to witness what they though was simply a tearjerker exploring the relationship between a spoiled rich playboy and a well-meaning widow of a revered doctor.Though it may be impossible to truly grasp all of Sirk's secrets after just one viewing, it seems to me that one of the critiques most notable here is the motivation these characters possess. Another reviewer described this film as a quest for spirituality. Redemption and understanding may also be added to this list as nearly all of these characters attempt to find consolation and faith in things that reflect their own artificial emotion and feelings. Do any of these characters truly have a moral center that guides their everyday actions? Or are they simply living out of guilt, fear, jealousy and self-loathing? These are loaded questions to be sure, but the more I write the more I am convinced that Magnificent Obsession is a loaded film.