**SPOILERS*** In what turned out to be the breakout movie for a 24 year old Robert Taylor like it was 20 years later for another Hollywood heartthrob Rock Hudson "Magnificent Obsession" shows that no matter how spoiled and rotten one is there's always hope when one finally sees the light of goodness through unselfish love and giving to other without wanting anything in return.
This is the golden rule that Doctor Hudson lived as well as died by. Hudson suffering a heart attack while taking his morning swim died before he could get help to save his life. The defibrillator that could have saved Dr. Hudson's life was at the time being used to save that good for nothing spoiled brat Robert Merrick, Robert Taylor. It was Merrick who after a night of partying and getting himself good and smashed ended up felling into the lake almost drowning himself! Why a man like Dr. Hudson who unselfishly saved hundreds of lives without even asking them to pay their, or his, doctors bills had to die so that a low down no good partying skunk like Merrick survived is the basis of the film "Magnificent Obsession". It was in Merrick meeting Dr. Hudson's distraught young wife, some 20 years his Junior, Helen (Irene Dunne) and later due to his fun loving and irresponsible nature had her lose her sight in a traffic accident that turn the young man completely around. It was the late Dr. Hudson mentor sculpture and philosopher Mr. Randolph, Ralph Morgan, who put, in bringing the very best out of him, the drunk and confused young man on the road to redemption.
Great five handkerchief Hollywood tearjerker with an unbelievingly tall dark and handsome Robert Taylor giving one of his best performances as the spoiled and later guilt ridden and saint-like Robert Merrick. It was Mr. Randolph was gave Merrick the will to overcame his demons in causing Mrs. Hudson, who held him responsible for her husbands death, blindness with what at the time he thought was his harmless boyish antics! Telling Merrick to give to others and not ask for nothing in return in fact was the reason that caused Mrs. Hudson her sight. In Merrick at first using Mr. Randolph rock hard philosophy on life to his advantage!
***SPOILERS*** Now a completely changed man Merrick went the whole nine yards and even farther to not only win the blind Mrs. Hudson's heart but restore her sight by attending and graduating medical school, at the top of his class, in order for him to do it! It took everything that he had, money time as well as his health, for Robert Merrick to achieve all this but it was well worth it to both him Mrs. Hudson and all those he helped along the way in restoring her lost sight that he was responsible for. Robert Merrick was totally obsessed in his redeeming himself by restoring Mrs. Hudson's sight! And that turned out to be not a lost caused, like the top eye specialists from all over Europe told him that it was, but an ten year obsession on his part. And as things were to turn out Robert Merrick's "Maginfient Obsession" in the end became a solid reality!
This is the golden rule that Doctor Hudson lived as well as died by. Hudson suffering a heart attack while taking his morning swim died before he could get help to save his life. The defibrillator that could have saved Dr. Hudson's life was at the time being used to save that good for nothing spoiled brat Robert Merrick, Robert Taylor. It was Merrick who after a night of partying and getting himself good and smashed ended up felling into the lake almost drowning himself! Why a man like Dr. Hudson who unselfishly saved hundreds of lives without even asking them to pay their, or his, doctors bills had to die so that a low down no good partying skunk like Merrick survived is the basis of the film "Magnificent Obsession". It was in Merrick meeting Dr. Hudson's distraught young wife, some 20 years his Junior, Helen (Irene Dunne) and later due to his fun loving and irresponsible nature had her lose her sight in a traffic accident that turn the young man completely around. It was the late Dr. Hudson mentor sculpture and philosopher Mr. Randolph, Ralph Morgan, who put, in bringing the very best out of him, the drunk and confused young man on the road to redemption.
Great five handkerchief Hollywood tearjerker with an unbelievingly tall dark and handsome Robert Taylor giving one of his best performances as the spoiled and later guilt ridden and saint-like Robert Merrick. It was Mr. Randolph was gave Merrick the will to overcame his demons in causing Mrs. Hudson, who held him responsible for her husbands death, blindness with what at the time he thought was his harmless boyish antics! Telling Merrick to give to others and not ask for nothing in return in fact was the reason that caused Mrs. Hudson her sight. In Merrick at first using Mr. Randolph rock hard philosophy on life to his advantage!
***SPOILERS*** Now a completely changed man Merrick went the whole nine yards and even farther to not only win the blind Mrs. Hudson's heart but restore her sight by attending and graduating medical school, at the top of his class, in order for him to do it! It took everything that he had, money time as well as his health, for Robert Merrick to achieve all this but it was well worth it to both him Mrs. Hudson and all those he helped along the way in restoring her lost sight that he was responsible for. Robert Merrick was totally obsessed in his redeeming himself by restoring Mrs. Hudson's sight! And that turned out to be not a lost caused, like the top eye specialists from all over Europe told him that it was, but an ten year obsession on his part. And as things were to turn out Robert Merrick's "Maginfient Obsession" in the end became a solid reality!