I'm happy to join in the praise for ATHA, but never at the expense of Magnificent Obsession, Written, Imitation of Life, Tarnished Angels, A Time to Love, All I Desire, and so on. I don't see any of these as flawed films in the slightest. I completely respect the preferences being voiced here, but so many of those being discussed are IMO in the very highest echelon of his oeuvre that I can't imagine picking and choosing between them (especially without it being quite clear to me how they're being evaluated, what assumptions are underlying different people's viewing and interpretation of them, etc.).
Case in point, I seem to be coming from a different place in my assessment of Magnificent Obsession than those here who refer to the basic plot as a kind of obstacle. As I briefly explained in an earlier post I find that the film is enriched by the element of distance, the way Sirk apparently complicated the simple narrative elements and messages. It's a fascinating case of ambivalence and contrast in adaptation. Surely that's not the only way to view it, of course. Because the film turned out to be what it is, problems with the story of the Douglas novel
per se don't really matter to me.
HerrSchreck wrote:...I watched The Tarnished Angels last nite and had an unexpectedly lukewarm response. Lots of great setpieces, but something about the story lacked a hook.
Get thee behind me, Satan. Er, I mean, I'm surprised that, even if it didn't work that well on any other level for you, Schreck, the visual style alone wouldn't have been enough to bowl you over (perhaps moreso with a 35mm print vs. a DVD).