Title: Rebecca Director: Alfred Hitchcock Starring: Laurence Olivier, Joan Fontaine Aspect Ratio: 1.33.1 Studio: Universal Studios Genre(s): Drama Rated: Not Rated     Buy From Amazon.com: Not yet available.

CONSUMER ADVICE

Parents, this movie is suitable for all audiences.

I have always felt that the scariest things in the world are the things you can't see and the things you don't know. M. Night Shamalon's "Signs" is a great example of why this logic is so true, as that movie is scary because major things happen in that movie that we can hear, but we can't see with our own eyes. Alfred Hitckcock's "Rebecca" provides an even better example of this logic, by naming the movie after a character who we never actually see or interact with. Come to think of it, this movie banks on us getting involved by telling us as little about things as humanly possible. The way it works is that the main character of the movie is Rebecca, yet we never see her or know her story. All we know is that several years ago, she died in a boating accident. Since Rebecca is dead, we follow around this other woman for the two hour film, a woman who's name we never learn. Sound confusing yet? It gets better (or is that worse). Remember the boat accident I mentioned earlier? Well, we don't even get all the details about that until the last half hour of the film.

By now I must have gotten your attention. If anything you must be wondering how a movie where nothing happens can possibly be interesting? Well, the logic behind the theory that things you can't see tend to scare you more then things you do steams from the fact that human nature fears things they don't understand. Scientists scramble to find the answers to every little thing they don't understand, because without answers the thing which they know nothing about has power over them. It is this exact reason "Rebecca" manages to capture you completely. The movie revolves around the afore mentioned nameless woman, who falls in love with the hansom Maxim de Winter, a rich ladies man who sweeps the woman off her feet, and proposes to her. The woman, who from this point on becomes known as Mrs.de Winter, thinks that her life can't possibly get any better from this point on. Since this is a Hitchcock film, we can only assume it will get worse.

When Mrs. de Winter meets the family and house servents of Maxim, she finds herself being hated by everyone. Rebecca's personal maid in particular seems to despise the new lady in the house, and Maxim's family doesn't show much support of his new wife either. This leaves the new Mrs. de Winter alone in this huge mansion with no one to talk to. There are never any pictures of Maxim's deceased wife, Rebecca, as he locked up all pictures of her. Her memory tortures him to this day, and the new Mrs. de Winter finds out the hard way how much she is really living in Rebecca's shadow. As with most Hitchcock films, the storyline is besides the point. Hitchcock really didn't consider the storyline to be a success if the audience wasn't swept up in the emotions. While the story for his more popular film "Psycho" can be summed up in one sentence, everyone who's seen the movie can tell you that the movie is complicated with heavy layers of suspense and characterization.

"Rebecca" is filmed in this same way. Not much happens during this movie, yet it is absorbing from start to finish. The fact that we know so little about the title character plays a big part in this, because the more we hear about the influence Rebecca had on everyone's lives, the more we feel intimidated by her. Even Maxim himself is surprisingly relunctant to talk about his late wife, which makes his outbursts all the more surprising whenever something is brought up about Rebecca. The film is extremely creepy, and as the movie drags on, the soulless mansion seems to get bigger and bigger, until it gets to the point where the new Mrs. de Winter can't help but feel lost in her own world. Despite the fact that there are almost no special effects in the movie, the visuals help carry the movie quite a bit. That said, the movie is not perfect.

One problem I had with this movie is the new Mrs. de Winter. While we feel for her plight and sympathcise with her and the situation surrounding here, there comes a point where we get annoyed with the girl and start begging her to show some backbone. I understand that everyone hates her, and that's got to be at least a little intimidating, but the fact that she doesn't make any real attempt to stand up for herself becomes tiresome at the seventy minute mark, and becomes almost unbearable when we reach the ninety minute mark. Although this is really the only major problem I have with the film. Shot in black and white, the movie has a creepy atmosphere that surrounds the movie. So much in fact, that there are scenes where miniture toys are used as sets, and I couldn't tell which sets were toys and which ones were not (Hitchcock used both kinds in this movie).

The music also contributes to the wonderful cinematography, creating a one-of-a-kind movie experience, to the point where the excellent acting is just the icing on the cake. Now then, I'm going to take this moment to comment on the awards themselves. In my humble opinion, "Rebecca" really got snubbed at the Oscars (or "hosed" if you will). While this movie won the Best Picture award in 1940, the movie really should have been treated better come awards night. Aside from the Best Picture award, the only other award this film won was for the cinematography. This movie was nominated for eleven Academy Awards, and most of the areas where this film exceeded in did not win.

All the actors were shunned, the screenplay wasn't awarded, the sets weren't awarded, the music wasn't awarded, and worst of all, Alfred Hitchcock himself did NOT win the award for Best Director, a moment that has been remembered by many movie buffs as one of the A.M.P.A.S.'s biggest blunders! In a movie where there are so many things that contribute to the overall experience of the film, the fact that this movie won so few awards is insulting. It might as well have not even won the Best Picture award. Not that the amount of Oscars a film wins is a true representation of it's worth ("Shakespear In Love" proved that), but it's so frustrating to see a great piece of filmmaking get treated so shoddy. Still, "Rebecca" is, at the end of the day, a great film. It may be a bit difficult to find this film though. It has long been out of print, and most copies of the movie sell for more then $100 dollars (I got my copy for $48.78, which is the cheapest I'd ever seen it for), and you obviously can't rent it. But if you can find this movie, by all means see it.