If you love the TV show Mad Men -- and you know you do -- then you should acquaint yourself with the films of Douglas Sirk.

Specifically, you should check out Sirk's contributions to the genre unfortunately known as "women's pictures." His 1950s melodramas Magnificent Obsession, All That Heaven Allows, There's Always Tomorrow, Written on the Wind, A Time to Love and Time to Die, and the Lana Turner classic Imitation of Life are mannered examinations of class and materialism that far surpass their categorization as trashy, mass-market soap operas. And they're wickedly entertaining.

As with Mad Men, Sirk's pictures cast a jaundiced eye on the way in which people feel trapped by the claustrophobic limitations of societal roles. What's sort of amazing is that he made these films during the 1950s, not looking back at the stultifying hypocrisy of the time after the fact, but while it was actually happening. At the time, his movies were lambasted by critics as populist crap -- the cinematic equivalent of today's made-for-Lifetime TV movies -- while the filmgoing public adored them. It took a couple of decades for critics to appreciate Sirk as a master of irony, injecting withering social commentary into mainstream movies, pointing out the repressive nature of America's post-war, materialist bourgeoisie.

A German filmmaker of Danish descent who left his homeland in 1937 because of his Jewish wife and his own political leanings, Sirk later admitted that he always felt like an outsider in American culture. In his 1968 book The American Cinema, film critic Andrew Sarris observed that "the essence of Sirkian cinema is the direct confrontation of all material, however fanciful and improbable." Because of critics like Sarris, cinephiles began to seriously look at Sirk's films as masterpieces of subversion, and to appreciate them for the director's impeccable visual style.

The release by the Criterion Collection of Sirk's 1953 film Magnificent Obsession offers a good place to start. Although hardly the best of Sirk's '50s melodramas, it touches on some of Sirk's favorite themes -- small-minded provincialism, upper-class entitlement, and the desire of man to break free of expectations.

Rock Hudson stars as Bob Merrick, a wealthy, self-centered, womanizing playboy who dropped out of medical school in order to follow his worldly bliss. After a speedboat accident, he's rushed to a small-town hospital, where it's decided that his only chance for survival is the use of a special resuscitator that's owned by the town's beloved Dr. Philips, who promptly has a heart attack and can't be resuscitated because Merrick's using the machine.

Dr. Philips' passing is devastating to the community, especially to his wife, Helen (Jane Wyman, in her first pairing with Hudson) and daughter, Joyce (Barbara Rush). After his death, the women discover that the good doctor had been giving money and medical treatment to many people in town, without asking for payment in return. As Merrick later learns, Philips believed in a 1950s Christian version of "paying it forward," believing that by doing good, his own life would be enriched in the process.

To give away the rest would be a shame -- but it does involve Helen going blind, Merrick falling in love with her, and his returning to medical school so he can find a way to cure her blindness. High melodrama, indeed. Throughout, Sirk uses a Technicolor palette to create the most gorgeous sort of controlled expressionism. Hudson and Wyman reunited for All That Heaven Allows, and although it's a far better film than this one (as is Todd Haynes' remake/homage, Far from Heaven) and Imitation of Life is a more fully realized Sirkian class drama, for the beginner this is an excellent introduction to the director's work.

Criterion's two-disc DVD release is, as usual, impeccable. The remastered transfer (in the original 2.00:1 aspect ratio) is gorgeous, with Sirk's love of color given more than its due. The Dolby 2.0 monaural sound is very clean and clear.

Disc One offer the film with optional commentary by Thomas Doherty, short interview-introductions with directors Allison Anders and Kathryn Bigelow, and the original theatrical trailer.

Disc Two features an earlier, black-and-white version of the film from 1935 (102 min.), and the 83-minute, 1991 documentary From UFA to Hollywood: Douglas Sirk Remembers. There's also a nice booklet with an essay by Geoffrey O'Brien.

Dawn Taylor admits to getting a little misty-eyed during this movie, although she did snicker at Hudson's shirtless scrubbing-for-surgery scene.

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