The first 10 minutes of this movie is an exercise in pure style. DE PALMA uses BERNARD HERMANN's stunning background score to great effect. The rest of the film never really measures up to the first 10 minutes.The story (by PAUL SCHRADER and DE PALMA) is preposterous. But frankly, who cares? The film is wonderful to look and HERMANN's score is a pleasure to listen to. I wonder if the makers of OLD BOY were inspired by this film.Geneviève Bujold is not in the same league as some of the stunning Hitchcockian heroines. Cliff Robertson grows on you as the film progresses. I guess he was perfect for the role of the Southern patriarch. John Lithgow looked sinister. He is never boring.(8/10)

Brian De Palma has never denied that his main influence is the work of Alfred Hitchcock, yet, his early movies especially, have often been unfairly dismissed as rip-off's. This, of course, is simply not true, and I argue that De Palma allow his films to flourish with his own sense of style and intrigue, while closely following themes that the great master observed himself. Of all his more Hitchcockian productions, Obsession is one his least remembered when compared to the likes of Dressed to Kill (1980) or Body Double (1984). It's certainly one of De Palma's more ludicrous and often outright barmy films, but there is much to enjoy here in a guilty sort of way.In 1959, wealthy real estate developer Michael Courtland (Cliff Robertson) receives a ransom note demanding $500,000 in cash for the return of his wife and daughter. The police are notified, and following a botched arrest, his wife and daughter are killed in a getaway car. Fifteen years later, Michael, who seems to exist in a state of reserved grief, arrives in Florence with his friend and business colleague Robert Lasalle (John Lithgow) to tie up a land deal. While visiting the church he met his wife years before, he meets a young painter named Sandra (Genevieve Bujold) who is the exact doppelgänger of his dead wife.For all its frequently ridiculous and quite predictable twists and turns and overwrought melodrama, Obsession succeeds thanks to some stylish direction from De Palma and Bernard Herrmann's lavish, Oscar-nominated score. You can see the ending a mile away, but it does include a nice twist that borders on the repulsive, and with Robertson's subdued performance and Lithgow's reliable charismatic sidekick, the film never becomes quite as silly as it really should be. The main influence here is obviously Vertigo (1958), but retains none of the psychological mystery of Hitchcock's masterpiece, taking a more direct thriller route instead. Don't expect any plausibility (even the most absent-minded viewer could pick apart the plot), but if you can put this aside - or even welcome it - Obsession is a memorable little thriller that is surely due a small revival.www.the-wrath-of-blog.blogspot.com

I have yet to see a film that Cliff Robertson , John Lithgow and/or Genevieve Bujold do not shine. And this is yet another example. Stellar actors. From start to finish this extraordinary film takes the audience on a mesmerizing journey. I vividly remember seeing this film with a family member in the 1980's , just the ending of the film, and without a doubt this would have to be one of the most moving scenes I've ever encountered. I dare anyone to watch this film and not be moved at the finale. Many modern movies have over-the-top special effects and minimal acting , where the audience is left deflated since they weren't able to connect with the characters. Here we have minimal special effects and stellar acting all around , as well as high quality musical composer Bernard Herrman.A lot of Brian da Palma's other films are overly laden with violence and gratuitous scenes, and yet somehow this film, Obsession, is an example of how you can make a highly engaging film that mesmerizes an audience WITHOUT any explicit material. I highly recommend this film as de Palma's best.

I was lucky to see this knowing nothing about the plot. This is one of those movies you really are better off not reading too much about it.I've seen a few films I liked from De Palma and I acknowledge his status, but he's far from my favorite director. There are a few of his films that I've started watching and maybe fallen asleep or something and never really returned to them. I think I've started this one for at least three times, never making it past first 10 minutes, but this time I made myself sit thru it.I am into slow paced movies, I really am, but this movie just drags even tho it's not even very long. The first 20 minutes are a bit more eventful, but after the kidnapping I just kept thinking why make the intro so long, when it didn't seem that relevant to the plot. Or so I thought, it actually was pretty relevant after all. The movie only really picks up in the last 10-15 minutes when things start to unfold and this is when you realize it's one sick and twisted story.The finale saves quite a lot, you'll be on your toes for the last few minutes, the very ending is one of the best scenes I've seen in a while. Too bad it doesn't completely save the movie when you totally loose interest (or never even get draw into it). It was very close I didn't stop watching it at some point, and I don't stop watching a movie easily. I figure one reason for the movie being so boring is that the lead actor Cliff Robertson is amazingly distant in this role, I was never interested in his character. Lithgow and Bujold are much better here, but I kept thinking how someone like Donald Sutherland would've done with the lead.Sutherland comparison coming from Don't Look Now, I kept thinking how these two movies were very similar in a way. Don't Look Now was much more intriguing and gripping and the actors more interesting. The movies are of course quite different plot wise, but they do have a lot in common like Italian locations, themes and the overall style.Still, I'm kind of glad I had the patience to sit thru this. The ending is something you really should see if you are into movies at all. I wouldn't recommend this to a casual movie watcher, but it's a must see for a movie geek of any kind. It's got a great Hitchcockian Hermann score and Vilmos Zsigmond's cinematography has some great shots, although the version I watched had a very bad picture quality, I don't know if this was a bad transfer to begin with, or maybe the dreamy images didn't like digital TV bitrates.