Connect with us
Armie Hammer and Lily James in "Rebecca"
Rebecca (L to R) Armie Hammer as Maxim de Winter, Lily James as Mrs. de Winter. Cr. KERRY BROWN/NETFLIX

Film

Netflix’s Rebecca is an Inert, Mediocre Remake

A young newlywed arrives at her husband’s imposing family estate on a windswept English coast and finds herself battling the shadow of his first wife, Rebecca, whose legacy lives on in the house long after her death.

How does Netflix’s new Rebecca stack up against the Hitchcock classic?

Rebecca, the Daphne du Maurier gothic novel from 1938 that was adapted by Alfred Hitchcock two years later, gets another movie adaption, 80 years later, that debuts on Netflix this week. 

The new Rebecca, directed by Ben Wheatley (High-Rise and Free Fire), is a relatively inert remake in which the two lead actors (Armie Hammer and Llly James) give uncharacteristically stiff performances, and the most memorable turns are from the third and fourth bananas. Let’s just say it won’t make anyone forget the original, which was the only Hitchcock film to win a Best Picture Oscar. In that film, Laurence Olivier and  Joan Fontaine played the leading roles. 

The du Maurier novel told the story of a young woman, never named, who meets and quickly marries a rich English aristocrat named Maxim de Winter and goes to live with him on his estate, called Manderley. It’s soon clear that the new Mrs. de Winter is living in the shadow of the previous, recently deceased Mrs. de Winter named Rebecca. She’s especially sneered at by the housekeeper, Mrs. Danvers (Kristin Scott Thomas), and made to feel at all times that she’s not good enough to take the previous woman’s place. 

At the end, things take a shocking turn, and then another one. 

How does Netflix’s new ‘Rebecca’ stack up against the Hitchcock classic and novel?

While the film is handsomely mounted and technically proficient and does a decent job with the crucial location of Manderley, it never really pops, and the reasons for that is that the two lead actors aren’t so great, either on their own or together. 

James, no stranger to English manor estates from her time on Downton Abbey, never quite finds the right register here. 

As for Armie Hammer, a critique has emerged in recent years that he’s a handsome nonentity and some kind of actorly embodiment of white privilege. While this is certainly true of a long list of young, male, and handsome white actors who truly aren’t all that talented, I’ve never found it true of Hammer, who’s been great on screen in everything from The Social Network to Call Me By Your Name. But in Rebecca, he’s just not good at all- stiff, uncharismatic. 

How does Netflix’s new ‘Rebecca’ stack up against the Hitchcock classic and novel?

The only truly memorable performances in the movie belong to Kristin Scott Thomas, as Mrs. Danvers, and Ann Dowd as Mrs. Van Hopper. 

Wheatley, not exactly the first director that comes to mind for material like this, also has trouble finding a consistent tone. It’s sort of a horror movie, and sort of a romance, and sort of a thriller, which were the sort of shifts that Hitchcock was much more capable of handling. And the whiplash-like plotting of the third act just comes off as goofy here, especially since the two main characters both seem to have had personality transplants since the first act. 

I’m far from opposed to Netflix remaking classic films, especially eight decades after the originals. But its version of Rebecca is just a whiff, all around. 

Written By

Stephen Silver is a journalist and film critic based in the Philadelphia area. He is the co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle and a Rotten Tomatoes-listed critic since 2008, and his work has appeared in New York Press, Philly Voice, The Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Tablet, The Times of Israel, and RogerEbert.com. In 2009, he became the first American journalist to interview both a sitting FCC chairman and a sitting host of "Jeopardy" on the same day.

Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Facebook

Trending

2001: A Space Odyssey 2001: A Space Odyssey

2001: Clarke and Kubrick’s Odyssey of Discovery

Culture

The Best Movies of 1973 The Best Movies of 1973

The Golden Year of Movies: 1973

Culture

SPIDER-MAN: ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE review SPIDER-MAN: ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE review

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse Is a Dazzling Web of Unbridled Creativity

Film

The Zone of Interest The Zone of Interest

Cannes 2023: Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest is a Manicured Vision of Hell

Culture

Jeanne Du Barry review Jeanne Du Barry review

Cannes 2023: Maïwenn’s Great Hair Goes to Great Lengths in Jeanne Du Barry

Culture

Asteroid City: A Gimmicky Vanity Project Asteroid City: A Gimmicky Vanity Project

Cannes 2023: Wes Anderson’s Asteroid City is a Gimmicky Vanity Project

Culture

Black Flies Gripping Black Flies Gripping

Cannes 2023: Black Flies— Gripping Descent into the Underbelly of New York’s Urban Misery 

Culture

Four Daughters Four Daughters

Cannes 2023: Four Daughters: A Family’s Journey From Goth to Niqab

Culture

La Passion de Dodin Bouffant: La Passion de Dodin Bouffant:

La Passion de Dodin Bouffant: Surfeit Cooking Drama Most Inane Film at Cannes

Culture

The Mother Jennifer Lopez and Lucy Paez The Mother Jennifer Lopez and Lucy Paez

Jennifer Lopez’s The Mother is Eerily Similar to Enough, But That’s Not a Bad Thing

Film

Godzilla 1998 Godzilla 1998

Godzilla at 25: When Hollywood Made a Manhattan Monster Movie, with Disastrous Results

Film

Starling Girl Starling Girl

The Starling Girl is a fine exploration of love, religion, and coming of age

Film

The Matrix Reloaded The Matrix Reloaded

20 Years Later: The Matrix Reloaded was Underwhelming, but Still Underrated

Film

Discovery channel Discovery channel

The Head-Scratching Moves Discovery Has Been Making

Culture

Le Retour: Controversially Mediocre French Contender Director: Catherine Corsini Le Retour: Controversially Mediocre French Contender Director: Catherine Corsini

Cannes 2023: Le Retour is a Controversially Mediocre French Contender

Culture

Fast X Fast X

Fast X Finally Reaches the Franchise’s Breaking Point

Film

Connect