Saw Rebecca again last night - but what was this movie I was expecting to see?

Cafe Society
1

What a great film Rebecca is - if Hitchcock was only ever going to win a Best Film Oscar for one of his films, this was a worthy candidate.

But for some reason, despite having seen it before I was expecting a different plot. That is, that the new Mrs de Winter gradually becomes more and more like the first one, whether it was under the influence of her husband, Mrs Danvers, the shade of the first Mrs de Winter, or just her own mind. She ends up being virtually identical. I can only imagine this was some other film that I’d conflated with Rebecca, but what film was that?

2

Vertigo?

3

The Tomb of Ligeia?

4

You must have been thinking of Roshomon.

5

That’s not how I remember it.

6

Notorious?

7

My Name is Julia Ross?

8

No… that’s a completely different plot than Rebecca (either real or what the OP thought it might be).

*Notorious *is the best Alfred Hitchock :slight_smile: but the heroine marries the bad guy and just pretends to be something she’s mostly not.

9

“We are protected by the enormity of your stupidity.”

–Cliffy

10

This is the film that best illustrates how Olivier changed acting. I’m sure that his fellow castmembers were all considered the top of the game, but Olivier’s performance shifted the dynamic from stagey, over-acting to a more subtle, nuanced role that pretty much everyone but Al Pacino and Nic Cage use in modern films.

He’s SO much better than his castmates in this film that it keeps me from appreciating an AMAZING film.

Plus, the fact that Hitchcock never won a competitive Oscar for directing is a crime.

11

Well, he must’ve shifted back again somewhere along the way. I just watched him in 1965’s Othello and whoa man! Switch to decaf!

12

This is a good call. Maybe also The Stepford Wives?

13

Good call, but sadly I’d never seen or heard of this move before, so I couldn’t have been thinking of it.

Similarly, I’ve never come across this either. However the plot’s different from the kind of thing I was thinking of; in my mind it was more that the new wife starts to dress and behave like the old one more or less voluntarily, although possibly under psychic pressure from the husband, the housekeeper, the house itself, or her own obsession with her.

14

Interestingly I also watched that just recently! If this is a whoosh it’s a good one … of course there is no second wife involved but I imagine you’re referring to the innovative plot device in there vis-a-vis my own faulty recollection.

15

Rebecca is one of my favorite films that I often forget to mention here.

To anyone reading this who might not have seen the film:

  1. Make a point of taping it on TCM or whatever channel you have in your country!
  2. Yes, it is a black and white film from “the old days”, but totally worth suffering through the lack of color.
  3. This film ropes you in from the first minute, and will take you through a story that is compelling and you have no idea how it ends!
  4. The ending is a “twist” and something you will never expect, nor forget!

A truly great film, and sorry I don’t mention it more often when those threads appear about “favorite films”.

16

But if you haven’t read the book or seen the film, please, please read the book first. The craftsmanship is cunning! And the suspense lasts at least a little longer. It’s one of my favorite books! It set a standard that nothing else in that genre has lived up to.