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After seeing Woman Obsessed, I realize that the Hollywood film industry lost such a talent when the great Susan Hayward died in March, 1975.

She epitomizes troubled women in one film after another. She was so good at it and Woman Obsessed is no exception.

As a remarried woman, still haunted by the tragic death of her first husband, Hayward shows mighty grit in this film with an on par terrific performance by Stephen Boyd, so great that year as Massala in Ben-Hur.

Boyd, as the second husband, appears bully-like in the treatment of Hayward's young son, who turns in quite a performance himself.

What made this flick so good was the wonderful compelling ending where reconciliation and good judgment come together.

***1/2 for a very good film.

Susan Hayward, to me, played a woman obsessed with not letting go -- of her dead husband and her past life with him.By refusing to grieve and face her present life and future, she takes herself, her son and new husband to the edge of destruction. The major actors did an excellent job of characterizing individuals who are caught in a cycle of rigidity -- rigidity of emotions, personal boundaries and lifestyle. An excellent study.

The title is a misnomer :actually ,it's the male character who had a mysterious past -revealed to the doctor at the end of the movie.

Henry Hathaway has always been one of my favorite American directors :he has always been eclectic ("lives of a Bengal lancer" and "Pete Ibbbetson" the same year!);here an interesting example of the way the director has almost totally mastered the style of Douglas Sirk's melodramas (particularly "all that heaven allows" and "all I desire").

Susan Hayward was perfect as ever as the widow whereas Stephen Boyd was trying to get rid of that "Messala skin" ,a thing he could never achieve:he gives an effective performance ,very nice when he appears for the first time,then oddly turning into a crude brute before redeeming himself ;whatever he plays ,he is convincing.

In fact,the worst character is the brat :his biological father disappears in the first minutes and the relationship with his son is underwritten;thus he sometimes appears selfish and even cruel (the pitchfork);ditto for Mary:she seems to be only concerned by her own pain,and it takes the words of a doctor -who becomes a true shrink- to make her feel that others too had a raw deal in their past .

Nice use of the locations and of the animals feeling the fire in the forest.

Susan Hayward, Stephen Boyd, and Theodore Bikel star in "Woman Obsessed," a 1959 film set in Canada.

Mary Shannon (Hayward) is a grieving widow with a young son (Dennis Holmes) who hires a man named Carter (Boyd) to help her with her farm. They eventually marry, in part to stop the town gossip. Carter turns out to be more troubled than he let on, and becomes angry with the boy, whom he considers a coward, and then violent toward Mary. When a crisis occurs, Mary learns what's behind Carter's outburst toward her son and the resulting violence toward her.

The acting in this film helps the movie, which is slowed down and cut up by too many establishing shots of beautiful scenery. Hayward does a good job as a strong woman who attempts to put her grief aside and move on, but finds it difficult. And Boyd is excellent as a man in great pain who faces rejection from the people he loves; the more he's rejected, the more angry he becomes.

Slow moving. It's a shame we lost Boyd so early on - he was a strong actor and very handsome.

This neighbors to the North melodrama was released by 20th Century Fox after Hayward's Oscar win for "I Want To Live!" It isn't a terrible film, but it isn't terribly good either. Hayward's Mary Sharron is widowed early in the story when her husband is killed by a falling flaming tree during a forest fire. Hayward grieves. Tries to run the farm herself. Is forced to hire moody Fred Carter (Steven Boyd). Hayward watches him chop wood in a tight white tee shirt and eventually marries him. Her son Robbie (Dennis Holmes) - a dreamy kid who hangs out by a quicksand pit and enjoys watching stock footage fauna frolic in the woods, has some difficulties with Carter - especially when Carter kills a deer and forces Robbie to watch the gutting. Carter gets tougher and touchier and more and more moody - he's a ball of psychological sturm und drang roiling with anger centered on his mamby pamby brother.... Carter's Canadian accent grows thicker as the plot careens toward rain and resolution. Carter rapes Mary - she becomes pregnant - Carter moves out to the barn - and threatens to leave altogether. Rain arrives, signaling: (as it always does) change. Carter carries Mary miles in the torrential downpour to town so that she can deliver her baby safely. She eventually learns of this selfless endeavor and her heart softens again. But, Carter is redeemed only after Robbie pulls him from the foreshadowed quicksand sinkhole. Unfortunately Hayward doesn't get much of a chance to crackle but fun performances and a decent amount of melodrama make this a fair one to catch.