Obsesión pasional

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, 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.

Woman Obsessed teams Susan Hayward and Stephen Boyd in a rugged northwestern about a widow and the farmhand she hires. Though set in Canada according to the Citadel Film Series book, The Films Of Susan Hayward the outdoor scenes were shot in Lone Pine, a location that director Henry Hathaway favored. He had shot The Trail Of The Lonesome Pine in that area over 20 years earlier.

When we first meet Hayward, she's a happy rural woman with husband Arthur Franz and son Dennis Holmes. But then Franz is killed and Susan's really up against it raising a child and trying to work a small farm. She hires a brooding Stephen Boyd as a hand.

Although not mentioned as per The Code, Hayward's got other needs that are subtly suggested and Boyd does have a superficial resemblance to Franz. But it's superficial only. Boyd is inarticulate and almost surly at times, especially around young Dennis Holmes.

This was the strength of Woman Obsessed. The plot could have gone in several directions, Boyd's very inarticulateness could have hidden great sadness, great humanity, or an incredible villainy. You really don't know until the end how it will turn out. Though Hayward is top billed, the film really does turn on Boyd's performance.

Also in the film is Theodore Bikel as the area's doctor, a very compassionate and humanitarian man and Barbara Nichols who just comes across too much as a wisecracking city dame. You don't find people like her in the rugged Northwest.

Woman Obsessed holds up well today. Canada still has rugged frontier area and people probably do still live the way Hayward and Boyd do.

I loved this movie because of Susan Hayward. But it is a good story, set in beautiful country. Stephen Boyd shows his devotion to both the mother and the son. The story line is beautiful and although it is somewhat flowery, it is believable. This is one of those memorable movies that one wants to see time and time again. And I have.

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.