An inane adaptation of the Daphne Du Maurier novel, Rebecca is little more than eye candy with the love affair across class lines between wealthy Maxim de Winter (Armie Hammer) and lady’s companion, Lily James amidst the soft focus, autumnal hued 1920s French Riviera coastlines.
Things change when the couple return to Cornwall and Manderley, the ancestral home on the windswept English coast where the legacy of Max’s deceased first wife, Rebecca de Winter, is all-pervasive. Housekeeper Mrs Danvers (Kristin Scott Thomas) maintains the dead woman’s presence in every detail. But not all is what it seems.
Inconsistent and desparate to be liked, the Rebecca of director Ben Wheatley falls at the first hurdle in comparison between the classic 1940 Hitchcock. In a desperate attempt to remain respectful towards the source material (the novel) but stamp his own take on the story, Wheatley has delivered a bland, albeit stylish, melodrama lacking in any suspense.
Rating: 44%
Director: Ben Wheatley (High-Rise, A Field in England)
Writer: Jane Goldman (The Debt, The Limehouse Golem), Joe Shrapnel (Seberg, Race), Anna Waterhouse (Seberg, Race) – adapted from the Daphne Du Maurier novel
Main cast: Armie Hammer (The Social Network, Final Portrait), Lily James (Cinderella, Baby Driver), Kristin Scott Thomas (The English Patient, Darkest Hour)
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