Rent Rebecca (1940)

Dark Compelling Romance - Rebecca review by GI

Alfred Hitchcock's dark and sinister adaptation of Daphne Du Maurier's fantastic romance novel (well worth reading). Filmed in black and white deliberately creating the sense of dread that looms over the story. Joan Fontaine plays a young, timid and naïve woman who by chance meets the domineering, wealthy and aristocratic Maxim de Winter (Laurence Olivier). After a whirlwind romance they marry and she is thrust into the life of a rich socialite for which she is totally unprepared. Maxim takes her back to his ancestral home, Manderley, in Cornwall. But she finds that Maxim's first wife, Rebecca who drowned in a boat accident, has a dominant presence over her life not least perpetrated by the cold and manipulative housekeeper, Mrs Danvers (Judith Anderson), and Maxim harbours a dark secret. For what is essentially a romance this plays out like a gothic thriller and in Hitchcock's hands it has a sense of evil attached making it a really compelling film. Fontaine is suitably meek but eventually finds a steely resolve and Olivier plays Maxim as rather chauvinistic and at times quite unpleasant but the reasons soon reveal themselves. This is a masterwork and a classic of cinema, I definitely recommend you see this if you've missed it.

This production is wonderful for its sustained, threatening atmosphere - Rebecca review by CH

Still chills, after 65 years, as only black-and-white can do. Hitchcock never fails to entertain. Sound quality has suffered a bit with age, and sadly there are no sub-titles.

Hitchcock's American Debut. - Rebecca review by Steve

Fairly faithful adaptation of Daphne Du Maurier's rewrite of Jane Eyre makes for one of the screen's great gothic romances. This was Alfred Hitchcock's debut at the dream factory and it is much longer and visually more spacious and opulent than his British films, with a more prominent score. 

Laurence Olivier is well cast for that touch of ruthlessness that he could never quite conceal. Judith Anderson is legendary as Mrs. Danvers, the malevolent housekeeper. And Joan Fontaine breaks your heart every single time as... well, we never even learn her name, as the book/film is titled after the first Mrs. de Winter!

She plays the unsophisticated girl who marries into one of the great homes of England, only to be tormented by the ambient memory of her husband's former wife. Sort of a love triangle, between the newlyweds and a memory. Fontaine is magnificent and definitive in the role. And as so often, underplays her natural beauty.

Supposedly Hitch wanted big changes but David Selznick insisted he stay close to the source novel. Some see this as more of a Selznick film. But the direction is exceptional, especially at creating an impression of the second Mrs. de Winter's isolation at Manderley. The ballroom scene is a triumph. Whoever provides the signature, this is a Hollywood classic.