Magnificent Obsession (1954)

The reckless and arrogant playboy Robert Merrick (Rock Hudson) has an accident with his motorboat but he is resuscitated with the resuscitator of the famous Dr. Wayne Phillips. Coincidently at the same time, Dr. Phillips has a heart attack and needs his apparatus, but he dies. Dr. Phillips's young wife, Helen (Jane Wyman), and his daughter Joyce (Barbara Rush) blame Bob Merrick for his irresponsibility and hate him. Sooner they discover that Dr. Phillips had secretly helped many people that adore him. When Merrick sees Helen Hudson, he flirts with her, but his unrequited affection irritates her. One day, Merrick is drunk and meets the artist Edward Randolph (Otto Kruger) by chance and he learns that Dr. Phillips secretly helped people without expecting any return or acknowledgement. One day, Merrick sees Helen in a restaurant and gets in her taxi. However Helen leaves the car upset with Merrick, another car runs over Helen and she becomes blind. Later Merrick meets Helen on the beach and lures her, introducing himself as Robinson. Meanwhile he financially helps her and hires a team of specialists to examine Helen in Switzerland. Helen is examined but the doctors advise her that they will not operate her. Meanwhile Merrick and Helen fall in love with each other but when Merrick proposes her, he discloses his true identity. On the next morning, Helen vanishes without any trace from the hotel with her nurse and friend Nancy (Agnes Moorehead). Merrick studies medicine and years later, he returns to Detroit and Randolph tells him that Helen is very sick in a small sanatorium in New Mexico. He heads to meet Helen with Randolph and finds her terminal, needing an urgent surgery. Without alternative, he has to operate her.

"Magnificent Obsession" is a remake without the magnetism of the original film. The story has minor modifications, actually updates and color, but the black and white movie of 1935 is better and better. The charm and chemistry of Irene Dunne and Robert Taylor are unrivalled. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Sublime Obsessão" ("Sublime Obsession")

Fmovies: I watched MAGNIFICENT OBSESSION yesterday, for the first time in a few years, as I worked my way through the Douglas Sirk Box Set.

Like all of Sirk's Hollywood movies, there's a lot more going on in the movie than there appears to be. That said, MO is probably the director's most eventful film. Where his other pictures concentrate on the dramatic psychological conflict between characters, this one has loads of life-altering events. Within the first reel, the male lead Bob Merrick is in an accident that takes him to death's door. And the female lead's husband dies of heart attack. A short while later the female lead, Helen Phillips (Jane Wyman) is involved in an accident that robs her of her sight. Ladle on top of this Sirk's sumptuous technicolor design schemes and all this melodrama might have seemed a bit contrived (you think?), it it hadn't been for the philosophical glue that Sirk binds it all together with.

In MAGNIFICENT OBSESSION, the doctrine espoused is reminiscent of Rhonda Byrne's "The Secret", and is so important to the story that the film derives its title from the unnamed philosophy that is referred to by its "prophet", Edward Randolph (Otto Krueger), as "a magnificent obsession". Yet Sirk wisely leaves the details in the background. We never really get the full picture of how the philosophy works, but this is how Sirk keeps the whole thing from becoming preachy.

Sirk himself claimed in an interview on BBC TV that he was more interested in the "circle of life" angle ... Dr Phillips dies so that Bob Merrick can live and carry on his good works for him. But whatever the director's intentions, what we ended up with was a superior romantic melodrama with a strong underlying sub-text that says, Give with no thought of receiving and the world will be a better place.

No argument from me ...

Predictably glossy (and shallow) Douglas Sirk remake of the 1935 film about a carefree playboy and a stolid widow brought together by chance and separated by tragedy--can he overcome the odds and make a happy ending for them both? Overblown romance elongated by foolishness, and everyone acting childishly. It's occasionally laughable yet nearly salvaged by a super-slick 1950s production-design that reeks of money. Performances by Jane Wyman and Rock Hudson (reunited the next year for Sirk's "All That Heaven Allows") are tolerable but do not set off cinematic sparks. A sudser for female audiences of the time, this now looks rather silly. ** from ****

Magnificent Obsession fmovies. Bob Merrick (Rock Hudson) gets his commuppance and learns to be not such a reckless rich twat, with the help of a fairy godfather and falling in love with a woman he made go blind!

If you've never heard of Douglas Sirk, be prepared that this will be melodrama city. Production values are superb, though. Sirk was a very talented craftsman, as well as creating a beautiful aesthetic for these films.

Sirk made the hospital and the classic American home look as artificial and sanitised as he could: with lipstick so bright and full the lips jump off the faces, sculpted hair and good looks, everything in its right place and colours so stark it looks like a children's colour book. These locales are contrasted with a couple of other places, darkly beautiful: the scene where Rock is sitting at a bar, which starts with the rather loose and drunk looking woman leaning up against the wall, with curls of cigarette smoke and beautiful light in the background. The other is the night scene in Paris, with such exquisite light coming through the doors of the apartment.

Rock is actually pretty good in the film, and really perfect looking. I can see why Sirk picked him out - he's a Ken doll - playing the fantasy American: rich, beautiful and devil-may-care. And after this flick, he was also a star.

3/5. I liked La Habanera better, though.

Jane Wyman is stiff and motionless both before and after becoming blind. She reacts to bad news as though someone has just told her the morning paper has been mislaid. She seems so much older than Rock Hudson that the love interest between them is unbelievable and seems silly. I thought she seems old enough to be his mother. Why do blind people in movies not recognize the voice of someone known prior to blindness? This also makes the story unbelievable. There is much music, mostly Chopin, in the background (coming to the foreground frequently). Rock Hudson's car is one of the most interesting items in this movie. A blind person would surely recognize the sound, smell, feel of a car like this! Based on this car and Hudson's valiant work to carry this movie, I give this a 5 star rating.

Douglas Sirk is known as the melodrama man,but all his movies are not exactly what we call melodrama:"All that heaven allows" and"tarnished angels" are closer to realist stories;"A time to love and a time to die" transcends melodrama to become a tragedy.Three major movies seem to belong to the genre:"written on the wind" "imitation of life " and of course this one."Magnificent obsession " has a plot so unlikely,so incredible that,in the hands of a lesser talent,it would have gathered nothing but horse -laugh:The beginning of the film is a succession of coincidences and combinations of circumstances so improbable you wonder whether Sirk will get away with it.Against all odds,he succeeds in this absurd task.Someone tells the hero that the one who devotes his life to others has chosen the rocky road,someone has been crucified for that.But once he has begun,this task will obsess him,and it's a magnificent obsession.So the selfish hero will undo the harm he's done . It's a double feat:Hudson's struggle is moving and Sirk ,who goes for broke,pulls off this extravaganza with panache.