59
Metascore
10 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 75Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertChicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertSometimes overwrought excess can be its own reward. If Obsession had been even a little more subtle, had made even a little more sense on some boring logical plane, it wouldn't have worked at all.
- 75Chicago ReaderJonathan RosenbaumChicago ReaderJonathan RosenbaumThere's nothing in the aesthetic and neo-Freudian delirium within hailing distance of Vertigo, and the plot's often more complicated than complex, but Herrmann's overpowering score and De Palma's endlessly circling camera movements do manage to cast a spell.
- 75Slant MagazineEric HendersonSlant MagazineEric HendersonBujold’s enthusiasm as a performer redeems the entire picture, especially when she’s asked to perform flashback scenes that shouldn’t work, but, thanks to her, represent another of De Palma’s fearlessly experimental whims.
- 70The A.V. ClubNoel MurrayThe A.V. ClubNoel MurrayThe heightened luridness of Obsession does succeed in making Vertigo’s twisty plot seem all the more inessential to that film’s power. What both movies do is cut a tale of murder and madness down to its essence, exploring characters who’ve been damaged by social expectations and their own desires.
- 50Time OutTime OutSchrader and De Palma's tribute to Hitchcock's Vertigo may lack the misogyny and bloodbath sensationalism of De Palma's later work, but it's still dressed up in a mortifyingly vacuous imitation of the Master's stylistic touches.
- 50TV Guide MagazineTV Guide MagazineFor a De Palma film, Obsession has much more suspense than violence, even if much of the premise and motivations are shamelessly culled from Hitchcock's Vertigo, as is composer Bernard Herrmann. The lack of originality, however, doesn't make Obsession any less effective, and the film has been generally overlooked in the spotty De Palma canon.
- 50The New York TimesVincent CanbyThe New York TimesVincent CanbyThe Schrader screenplay, based on an original story by Mr. Schrader and Mr. De Palma, is most effective when it's most romantic, and transparent when it attempts to be mysterious.
- 40The New York TimesWalter GoodmanThe New York TimesWalter GoodmanWhatever shred of credibility the movie retains is dispersed by the final, dead serious directorial hocus‐pocus.