“Last night, I dreamt I went to Manderley again.” Rebecca’s haunting opening line conjures the entirety of Hitchcock’s romantic, suspenseful, elegant film.
A young woman (Joan Fontaine) believes her every dream has come true when her whirlwind romance with the dashing Maxim de Winter culminates in marriage.
But she soon realizes that Rebecca, the late first Mrs. de Winter, haunts both the temperamental, brooding Maxim and the de Winter mansion, Manderley.
In order for Maxim and the new Mrs. de Winter to have a future, Rebecca’s spell must be broken and the mystery of her violent death unraveled.
The first collaboration between producer David O. Selznick and Hitchcock, Rebecca was adapted from Daphne du Maurier’s popular novel and won the 1940 Academy Award™ for Best Picture and Cinematography (Black and White). -- The Criterion Collection
Cast: Joan Fontaine, Laurence Olivier, George Sanders, Judith Anderson, Gladys Cooper, Nigel Bruce, Reginald Denny, C. Aubrey Smith, Melville Cooper, Florence Bates
Read about this film
Title: Rebecca (1940)
Directed by: Alfred Hitchcock
Date of birth: 13 August 1899, Leytonstone, London, England, UK
Date of death: 29 April 1980, Los Angeles, California, USA
Writing credits:
Daphne Du Maurier (novel), Philip MacDonald
Music by: Franz Waxman
Country: USA
Language: English
Color: Black and White
Runtime: 130 min.