Customer Reviews

MAGNIFICENT OBSESSION/ DVD Rock Hudson

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Although the quality is not up to restored standard - it must have been transferred from VHS, and the picture and sound quality is very variable - it is nevertheless wonderful to have it available on DVD. Technical details - there is no scene selection, but there are English subtitles, which help when the sound gets a bit too crackly! Also of course no extras. But hey, it was only $9.95 anyway - who can argue with a price like that, when it isn't available any other way. I probably haven't seen it for almost 50 years, but it still works its magic. Let's just hope that Criterion can get hold of it and restore it to its original technicolour glory!

Inspiring! The message movie we want our kids to absorb and carry in their hearts.If this had been made in the 80's or 90's, Brad Pitt in the playboy's role would have had mega hit. A spoiled, rich, bon vivant crashes a speed boat requiring a resuscitator just at the moment it is also needed to safe the life of the local doctor. Upon recuperating, he finds his money is distained and thrown back at him. The doctor's widow won't even hear his apology!The tragedy is compounded, as she is struck by a car while trying to flee from him. Only when he knows she is blind does his remorse become genuine and a driving force in his life. He wakes with a huge hangover and is faced with a true benefactor.The wiser, older, gentle man instructs him to live the rest of his life in service to those less fortunate, and never accept payback nor seek glory. The drive, he promises, will become a self-renewing energy: a Magnificent Obsession. The reformed playboy returns to his abandoned studies and becomes a neurosurgeon, and a workaholic. There may be more studio and backlot shots, subbing for Europe and other locations, in this than we really want to count. But, in this day of CGI, who cares. We feel his genuine longing for something that can never be as the result of a headstrong, youthful lack of judgement. One by one, others forgive him for what he cannot forgive himself. In true Hollywood style: there is redemption in the end. This film was a young Rock Hudson's big break. The chemistry works so well, Hudson and Jane Wyman teamed again in All That Heaven Allows, with Agnes Moorehead as Jane's supportive friend.

My copy of Magnificent Obsession has arrived covered with Chinese hyroglifics. I am not amused - as Her Majesty would say. I'm usually soooo careful,too. Take my advice folks - wait until the real McCoy is released through Amazon. Read the small print BEFORE ordering.
Just for the record, the volume is terrible, very scratchy in places.
Save your coin, as I said.

I have just completed watching this fantastic movie. yes, it has Japenese "art work" all over it, yet I had no problem with the picture or sound. It's a pity Universal has not released a restored version, with beautiful colors and sound - instead of a Chinese or Japanese version. Many of these great old movies, are just not released by studios. But I wanted very much to see this movie and it was well worth it. A beautiful love story with an intellectual and spirital lesson. I highly recommend it to anyone who remembers back in the early 50's, when they first saw it. I highly recommend it, even though it would be rated G - but it shows that life can have real meaning to it.

the movie was good. it seemed like the movie had been re-recorded off of a copy of the original movie. I still liked it and you could watch it.