Matrixston Wow! Such a good movie.

AniInterview Sorry, this movie sucks

Moustroll Good movie but grossly overrated

Winifred The movie is made so realistic it has a lot of that WoW feeling at the right moments and never tooo over the top. the suspense is done so well and the emotion is felt. Very well put together with the music and all.

djangozelf-12351 This had one of the baddest plots ever and you could see it coming from miles of. At a certain point about 40 minutes in you all ready know what the conclusion will be because it all obvious points to that. There is simply no set up for anything else so the story basically unfolds without any surprises and a very predictable ending.The characters make illogical decisions and there is a real lack of chemistry between them and some explanations are ludicrous like the nine year old girl that seems to forget her former life because its convenient to the script.Movie has a lot of these examples and most of the time just drags one for that "shocking moment" at the end which it does not deliver because you all ready know that.A later movie from De Palma "raising Cain" which has some of the same subject matter is a far better movie than this both visually and plot wise so your better of watching that.This was compared to Hitchcock but while his movies will stand the test of time this one from De Palma shows he still had a lot to learn about story telling.He got it eventually but he can write this one of as a fail.

Spikeopath Obsession is directed by Brian De Palma and written by Paul Schrader. It stars Cliff Robertson, Genevieve Bujold and John Lithgow. Music is by Bernard Herrmann and cinematography by Vismos Zsigmond.You either love him or hate him, it seems. Brian De Palma that is. He's an amazing stylist who made some piercingly great thrillers in the tradition of Maestro Hitchcock, or he's a knock off artist using style to hide his inadequacies as a story teller? One thing for sure, for a good portion of the 70s and 80s his films would not be ignored, for better or worse depending on your own proclivities of course.Obsession, as has been noted numerous times, is De Palma's homage to Hitchcock's masterpiece, Vertigo. It's not a straight out copy as some reviewers have somehow managed to convince themselves, but narrative drive is similar. Robertson in grief for a passed on wife (Bujold) and daughter meets a doppelganger (also Bujold) of his dead wife 16 years down the line and becomes obsessed with her. As the new woman reciprocates the attraction, the relationship becomes wrought and borderline unhealthy, reaching a crescendo when muddy waters are stirred and revelations force the can to open and worms to spill everywhere.When remembering that for a long time Vertigo was out of circulation in the 70s, Obsession was sure as hell a good second option for anyone hankering for a superbly stylish thriller boiling over with psychological smarts. Even if you buy into the style over substance argument, what style there is here though. Roving camera work, up tilts, haze surrounds, canted frames, pan arounds, dream shimmers and personalised focus. Add in the splendid use of New Orleans and Tuscany locations and Herrmann's sensually dangerous score (lifted in part and re-worked from Vertigo) and it has style to burn. While the big reveals at pic's culmination are in turn intriguing and daring; even if the original ending planned would have really put the cat among the pigeons and made for a more potent piece ripe for heated discussion.Lead cast are on fine form, Robertson plays it superbly as a wistful and damaged wastrel, guilt and obsession seeping from every pore. Bujold is just darling, a telling twin performance that actually doesn't demand to be noticed until late in the play. While Lithgow stomps around the edges of the frame like some shyster lawyer whose tie is on too tight. Ultimately Obsession is a film crafted in the mode of Hitchcock, but not in anyway disgracefully so. This is no illegitimate relation to Vertigo, it's more like a reliable brother-in-law. Pulpy, Trashy but also Classy. Great. 8/10

tomgillespie2002 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

Raymond 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.