AT RUBIN MUSEUM OF ART - INTRODUCTION BY NEUROSCIENTIST STEPHEN MACKNIK
Brian De Palma's Obsession will screen this Friday, February 6th, at New York City's Rubin Museum Of Art. The screening, which begins at 9:30pm, is part of a Friday night series called Cabaret Cinema, "Where Movies and Martinis Mix." The films chosen explore "themes featured in the museum's galleries," according to the Cabaret Cinema page. "Each film is introduced by a notable guest to provide context."For Obsession, the notable guest is neuroscientist Stephen Macknik, co-author of the book Sleights Of Mind. The description at the book's website states that Macknik and co-author Susana Martinez-Conde are "founders of the exciting new discipline of NeuroMagic — and also members of the Magic Castle, Magic Circle, International Brotherhood of Magicians, and the Society of American Magicians," and that they "have convinced some of the world’s greatest magicians to allow scientists to study their techniques for tricking the brain." So it all makes sense-- in Obsession, De Palma and Paul Schrader, inspired by Hitchcock, have created a masterful magic trick of the cinema.
The Rubin Museum's website includes an excerpt from Richard Schickel 1976 review of the film for TIME: "...Exquisite entertainment...The film also throws into high melodramatic relief certain recognizable human truths: the shock of sudden loss, the panic of the effort to recoup, the mourning and guilt that blind the protagonist to a multitude of suspicious signs as he seeks expiation and a chance to relive his life. In a sense, the movie offers viewers the opportunity to do the same thing—by going back to a more romantic era of the cinema and the simple, touching pleasures denied the audience by the current anti-romantic spirit of the movies."