MAGNIFICENT OBSESSION
US, 1954, 108 minutes, Colour.
Jane Wyman, Rock Hudson, Barbara Rush, Agnes Moorehead, Otto Kruger.
Directed by Douglas Sirk.
Magnificent Obsession is based on a novel by Lloyd C. Douglas, author of The Robe. It was already filmed by John M. Stahl, veteran director of a number of soap opera-style popular novels like Imitation of Life and Back Street, with Irene Dunne and a young Robert Taylor.
This film is given the full lush Universal Studios treatment of the mid-1950s. Jane Wyman was a popular actress, had won an Oscar for Johnny Belinda, and plays Helen Phillips very well and persuasively. The up-and-coming Rock Hudson plays the young doctor who is responsible for the car accident and the blinding of Helen and who then studies, gives himself to the helping of Helen to regain her sight and, of course, falling in love. Barbara Rush plays Jane Wyman’s sister.
The film was directed by Douglas Sirk who had come from Nazi Germany in the 1930s, had made a number of popular films in the United States, concentrating in the early 1950s on B-budget films, especially westerns and musicals. However, with this film he made a breakthrough and established a reputation with such films as All That Heaven Allows (with Wyman and Hudson), Written on the Wind for which Dorothy Malone won an Oscar, Imitation of Life.
Much admired in later decades, his style was imitated by Todd Haynes in the tribute film, Far From Heaven, with Julianne Moore and Dennis Quaid.
This is probably the classic weepy of the first half of the 1950s.
1. The status of the story as a Lloyd C. Douglas novel, the various film versions? Women's pictures, from the thirties to the fifties? The particular ingredients, design, aiming at feminine sensibility? Was this film a success within this tradition?
2. The production values, colour, musical score, stars? A wealthy world, glossy treatment, lush overtones? A real world or a fantasy world? A world of wish fulfilment?
3. The basic appeal of the plot in terms of romance, service? How interesting a plot? A masculine response, feminine response? The interplay of the stars within this context?
4. How important was the plausibility of the plot in terms of realism? The plausibility in terms of symbols of good, sin, repentance, dedication? Did the film work on this level?
5. Audience response to the opening and the situation of Dr Phillips' death? Sharing the desperation and the frustration of Helen and Joyce? Reaction to Bob Merrick as a selfish playboy? A means of introducing the characters, taking point of view, gearing an emotional response? The relationship of
emotional response to judgment of characters and actions?
6. The Rock Hudson hero in Bob? The wealthy type, his way of life, irresponsible values? The accident? His feelings at the death of Dr Phillips, his trying to offer sympathy to the Sisters? His continued pursuit of Helen and ultimately
being responsible for her blindness? irresponsibility?
7. The importance of the character of Randolph and his optimistic philosophy of life? The magnificent obsession and dedication? How credible is this philosophy, how religious, how realistically optimistic? This making the film a kind of quest for Bob Merrick? How edifying, how moralising?
Preaching?
8. Bob and his attempts to put this into practice and the further danger for Helen in her blindness?
9. Helen and the result of her accident? Her attitude towards Bob Merrick? Her gradual acceptance of her blindness? and audience sympathy and feeling for her? The sequences of the beach, reading? Her encountering Bob as an anonymous friend? The effect of the friendship and the change into love?
When did she realise that it was Bob?
10. Joyce as a character contrasting with her sister? Hostility towards Bob, only concealing the truth for love of her sister? Nancy Ashford as the ironic companion? Support for Helen? For Bob? Her contribution to the plot and atmosphere?
11. The importance of Bob's attempts at dedication, first of all through money? Paying for Helen's treatment? The gradual communication, the letters? The blossoming of the love, the telling of the truth, the meeting? The importance of the European settings?
12. Her disappearance? The effect on Bob, the effect on Helen? The importance for Bob that be make something of his life, his return to the medical profession, skills? (Credible in itself, for the purposes of the plot and the message?)
13. The passing of the years and the effect that this has on an audience and their hopes? Helen's reappearance, illness, the coincidences? The build-up to the final operation and the fulfilment of the obsession?
14. The value of emotional involvement, tears? The world of feeling, judgment? how optimistic is a film of this kind?
