Written on the Wind

In countless ways visible and invisible, Sirk's sly subversion skewed American popular culture, and helped launch a new age of irony. Read full review

The ultimate in lush melodrama, Written on the Wind is, along with Imitation of Life, Douglas Sirk's finest directorial effort, and one of the most notable critiques of the American family ever made. Read full review

Boiling over with heated acting and schmaltzy scores, Douglas Sirk’s ’50s melodramas tap neatly into our collective trash psyche. Penetrate the surface, however, and they’re as serious and heartfelt as their director was. Read full review

The movie, one of Sirk's most popular, is impeccably designed and shot but also gaudy, garish, full of jukebox colors and feverish emotions. It's about the "broken" screen characters Sirk says he loves most--and it really gets to you. [14 Apr 2006, p.C6]

Rock Hudson and Lauren Bacall are the nominal stars, but the show is stolen by Robert Stack and Oscar-winning Dorothy Malone as a pair of seriously dysfunctional siblings, heirs to a Texas oil fortune. The tale of betrayal, misguided affection and sexual anxiety plays out in shiny Technicolor against an all-too-symbolic backdrop of oil derricks. [13 Jul 2001]

The acting is dynamite, the melodrama is compulsive, the photography, lighting, and design share a bold disregard for realism. It's not an old movie; it's a film for the future. Read full review

Polished melodrama of considerable psychological and social subtlety. [03 Feb 2013, p.43]

This oil-family story is way, way east of Eden. Were I asked to choose, Written on the Wind would blow in as my favorite Sirk film. Read full review

Tiptop scripting from the Robert Wilder novel, dramatically deft direction by Douglas Sirk and sock performances by the cast give the story development a follow-through. Read full review

Though glossy, Sirk's film is tightly structured, with a creative manipulation of light and reflection, and heavy with the symbolism of male destructiveness. Unflinching in its often ugly revelation of character and consequence, it's an intense and powerful film. Read full review

Deliciously addictive. [12 Jul 2001, p.18]

Oil derricks, booze, sports cars and nymphomania spelled huge box office. [10 Feb 2004]

Basically, this is slick magazine stuff, pretty trashy, but so entertainingly and professionally done that you can't help having one hell of a good time. [20 Feb 1957, p.6]

The Director, Douglas Sirk, shows his talent for whipping up sour, stylized soap operas in posh settings.

The trouble with this romantic picture—among other minor things, including Mr. Stack's absurd performance and another even more so by Miss Malone—is that nothing really happens, the complications within the characters are never clear and the sloppy, self-pitying fellow at the center of the whole thing is a bore. Read full review