‘I’m asking you to marry me, you little fool…’
The thing that makes Rebecca such a beloved and powerful novel is that everybody has felt out of place at some point in their life. Everyone has suffered from imposter syndrome. The unnamed narrator and protagonist of Rebecca experiences this feeling in exelcis, to the point that it becomes unbearable. The film does a wonderful job of capturing this discomfort also…
Maxim de Winter (Laurence Olivier) has a dead wife (the titular Rebecca) and a huge mansion (the imposing and intimidating Manderly). He begins to think that he can leave his old troubles behind when he meets a young lady’s companion (Joan Fontaine). Upon their arrival at Manderly, it becomes clear that things aren’t all as they seem. Muddying the waters further is Mrs Danvers (Judith Anderson), the vindictive housekeeper, and Rebecca’s caddish first cousin Jack Favell (George Sanders).
It must first be noted that master director Alfred Hitchcock reigns in his more artistic impulses and simply tells the story without bells and whistles. A wise move from the old maestro. He does assemble a killer cast, however, with both Olivier and Fontaine inhabiting their roles perfectly, and Anderson suitably malevolent as Danvers. Fontaine in particular does a great job in conveying everything that is spelt out in text in the novel with only a furrowed brow or a sideways glance.
As with all classic novels, the film doesn’t quite do justice to the source material, the harrowing costume party from the book is scandalously cut short here, but on the whole, Hitch does a tremendous job in translating this story for the big screen – as you would expect from one of the greatest directors of all time.
Read the book first, but then go straight to the film. Both are exceptional in their own way.