Revisiting Rebecca (Pt 5): Burn It Down, Mrs Danvers
Saturday, April 18, 2015 at 4:00PM 
Previously on "Revisiting Rebecca"
Pt 1 - a whirlwind de Winter courtship
Pt 2 - return to Manderley, meet Mrs Danvers
Pt 3 - feel up Rebecca's lingerie
Pt 4 - attend a costume ball but don't jump out the window, young lady!
...And here is Jason, with our final installment.
1:44:50 We fade up from a kiss to a sign reading "Kerrith Board School 1872." It seems so exact it made me wonder if this is a real place, but a quick google comes up with nothing. I assume this, like most everything save the more obvious natural exteriors (the beaches filmed on the California coast, for example), was a set. It seems an odd detail to so prominently focus upon though. My guess is Hitch liked the connection to The Past, with it hanging over everyone – he was never exactly the most subtle with his themes.
In the Hitchcock/Truffaut book the two filmmakers discuss how "the location of [Manderley] is never specified in a geographical sense; it's completely isolated." Hitch actually talks at length about how he sees this possibility of isolation as an "American" thing -- that if Rebecca had been filmed in Great Britain he'd have shown the countryside surrounding the house but filming it in America gave him the possibility of this "abstraction." It certainly helps that whenever we’re seeing the mansion itself it’s always a miniature, and not an actual location. Anyway, here we are... Where ever here is!
Continue on to the final installment
1:45:01 A bug-eyed bobby is telling an assembled crowd a story.
Cop: Blackjack Brady was his name. The most important arrest I ever made. It must've been about two years ago now. Of course there was no doubt about it. He was hung a month after I caught him.
Again, an odd way to start this scene. I think, like the 1872 sign signaling The Past, this little throwaway drapes the spectres of judgment and guilt across what’s to come. People will get what’s coming to them.
1:45:14 Ol' Balmy Ben! He should've gotten his own spin-off movie or television series. The Adventures of Ol’ Balmy Ben. Somebody asks him a question and he just keeps saying "I didn't see nuffin. I don't want to go to the asylum." Over and over, what fun it would be. Reboots be happening everywhere, let’s do this. He could be played by Monk star Tony Shalhoub, who would win every Emmy.
1:45:50 The camera crawls backwards to show the inquest audience, it's a full house. This was before TV, remember. This was their I Love Lucy. [More...]
We get our first look at Mrs. de Winter (sidenote: I’m gonna call her "MDW" from now on because it's important we confuse the matter of her name; it's what they wanted) rocking some seriously stylish courtroom attire. You know MDW has momentarily gotten her mojo because she's blatantly blocking Mrs. Danvers' view with her enormous sporty fedora. Danvers, never one to be outdone, is herself blocking the next five rows after that with that Mile-high Mourning Mitre she's sporting.
1:46:02 Goodbye Ol' Balmy Ben. Best o' luck not going to that asylum. And hello, George Sanders.
Mrs. Danvers expression, like Judith Anderson’s every expression in this astonishing performance - Jane Darwell who? No really, who? - could be a thousand different things all at once. I personally think she’s just always caressing those silky undergarments in her mind’s eye and that’s why she’s always half a world away.
1:46:40 Boat Dude testifying about Boat Stuff. As usual when it comes to Hitchcock the actual resolution of the mysteries he’s been exploring are the thing he’s the least interested in. Basically all the talking becomes white noise for the next couple of minutes as his shots get shorter and the angles more canted and the tension ratchets up for no real reason other than he can do such things with ease.
In fact one of my favorite passages from the Hitchcock/Truffaut book takes place talking about the resolution of this film, so let’s recount that instead of listening to what Boat Dude’s saying about knocking holes in wood. I am leaping ahead a bit here so consider this like the scene in Vertigo where (spoiler) Judy confesses at the mid-way point, but as you'll see, the exact details are pretty much beside the point with Hitch.
Hitchcock: Of course there’s a terrible flaw in the story, which our friends, the plausibles, never picked up. On the night when Rebecca’s body is found, a rather unlikely coincidence is revealed: on the very evening she is supposed to have drowned, another woman’s body is picked up two miles down the beach. And this enables the hero to identify that second body as his wife’s. Why wasn’t there an inquest at the time the unknown woman’s body was discovered?
Truffaut: Yes, that is a coincidence, but the whole story is so completely dominated by the psychological elements that no one pays any attention to the explanations, particularly since they don’t really affect the basic situation. As a matter of fact, I never completely understood the final explanation.
Hitchcock: Well, the explanation is that Rebecca wasn’t killed by her husband; she committed suicide because she had cancer.
Truffaut: Well, I understood that, because it’s specifically stated, but what I’m not too clear about is whether the husband himself believes that he is guilty.
Hitchcock: No, he doesn’t.
In other words, “blah blah she’s dead and everybody’s guilty and nobody’s guilty all at once… MacGuffin time.” (Sung to the tune of “U Can’t Touch This.”)
1:48:07 So Maxim gets called to the stand… well okay there’s not really a “stand” he just sort of… stands. I’m not a lawyer, I don’t watch lawyer shows, and I’ve never pushed my cheating pregnant wife onto boat tackle as a surprise cancer mercy killing, so my knowledge of the differences between “inquests” and “trials” is as slight as one of Rebecca’s nighties. (Cut to Mrs. Danvers swooning.) So excuse me if I keep misusing trial terminology, is my point.
Even though Maxim just promised MDW in the last scene that he’ll keep his cool it takes like five words for him to start screaming; he’s totally the kind of guy who gets a waiter fired for bringing him lukewarm soup. Meanwhile out in the audience the weight of her enormous sporty fedora begins to cause MDW great agony, and she twitches and trembles erratically, until it’s suddenly too much to bear and she collapses onto the floor from it.
Smooth as ever, lady.
1:49:30 Lunch break! The de Winters head out to their car to no doubt dine on travel-size packets of imported vichyssoise and grape leaves; as they do. I love what we see of Hitchcock’s idea of “Bustling Small-town America” – there sure is a lot of bicycling and hoop-rolling going on. Those crazy kids, with their hoop-rolling. (Seriously though on the way to their car they pass approximately one thousand bikes. Wherever this town is they’re putting even Portland to shame.)
1:50:05 They get into the biggest back-seat any car has ever had and MDW immediately starts getting drunk. Not that anybody can blame her -- for god's sake, this shit was not the bargain she signed up for. Then Maxim leaves MDW alone for a split second. She reassures him not to worry, she’ll be fine, which when translated into Human-English from MDW-Speak means it’s only a matter of moments until her husband’s dead wife’s sex-cousin is staring up her skirt.
And howdy, George Sanders.
It’s a recurring joke in this movie, George Sanders popping up in windows, and it never fails to amuse. Although here’s where I admit that in a post-Inglourious Basterds world whenever I hear George Sanders' sweet mellifluous voice I think of Michael Fassbender… granted it takes very little to make me think of Michael Fassbender. Skyscrapers, hot dogs, inseams – Fassbender, Fassbender, Fassbender. What was I talking about again?
George Sanders calls himself a bloke and tells MDW she’s “grown up a bit since I last saw you” as he leers at her with all the subtlety of a Tex Avery cartoon. Before he can impregnate a second MDW, Maxim comes storming back into the car the way Larry Olivier's always storming into things. George Sanders (and I have to keep calling him George Sanders – George Sanders is always George Sanders) isn’t going anywhere though – he’s got chicken legs to chew (and I’m not talking about the ones poking out of MDW’s skirt, wokka wokka) and blackmail to address. Sometimes both at once:
George Sanders: By the way, what do you do with old bones? Bury them, eh, what?
1:53: 40 Maxim and George Sanders head to back room of the bar across the street to hammer out their bones, as it were. Okay not until I wrote that sentence did I imagine shipping those two, but now that that’s out there my brain’s taking this movie in a whole ‘nother direction. Maxim, ever the gay sex stick in the mud, poops the party with the po-po though – he calls George Sanders’ bluff and blah blah it’s plot gibberish again.
One fun tid-bit comes out here though – Ol’ Balmy Ben’s a peeper! He peeped a peck of George Sanders and Rebecca having their cousin-sex one time, on a very special episode of The Adventures of Ol’ Balmy Ben, starring Emmy-winner Tony Shaloub.
1:56:30 George Sanders then basically calls MDW a man-hopping trollop and gets a prompt walloping from Maxim for it. George Sanders acts punched well though, shaking his head and sniffing, while a single lock of hair dangles down his forehead. Not two, not four – just one. George Sanders even suffers with panache.
1:57:40 Enter the Danvers! (The “Dun dun dun” is implied.) Or, as George Sanders calls her, “The Missing Link.” What a lady-killer, that George Sanders. Do note the battle of the hats being waged again, what with MDW’s taking up the lower right corner of the frame. Danvers has reasserted her hat dominance! And as she speaks the camera swoops in as it always does whenever Mrs. Danvers speaks, in thrall as we all are. But Danvers’ passions are getting the best of her now.
Mrs. Danvers: She had a right to amuse herself, didn’t she? Love was a game to her. Only a game. It made her laugh, I tell you. She used to sit on her bed and rock with laughter at the lot of you.
The thing about this scene is Hitchcock really does allow you to see and feel George Sanders and Mrs Danvers love for Rebecca, despite it all. They’re mourning this woman they lost – they only want the truth, and refuse to believe the fishy story being handed them. It’s perfectly understandable. And hey, if I had a twitchy Joan Fontaine hiding broken statues on me like a four year old I might get a wee bit fed up myself. Point being, we are all Mrs. Danvers.
1:59:08 I have got to admit that I feel as if Judith Anderson might overplay her shock a bit here when George Sanders suggests Maxim murdered Rebecca though. Blasphemy, I know. But had the thought really never occurred to Danvers before this moment? It seems unlikely she’d have been that naïve, or at least open to teering her grief in that direction; no doubt her jealousy extended to Maxim long before this – it’s only a tiny leap.
Still, you can see the seeds of the off-the-deep-end to come being planted right here. And I love that she hesitates on giving up Rebecca’s secret doctor’s name until she catches sight of MDW again and the name and exact address spills right out of her. It’s a total “I’ll get you, my pretty… and your gigantic fedora too” moment.
There’s also a very funny bit of staging with Mrs. Danvers wildly eye-balling Maxim, now thinking he’s a murderer, with a huge pair of antlers behind his head making him out to be the devil himself. This, along with many other sneaky clues, makes me pretty sure that Hitchcock identified with nobody more than he did Mrs. Danvers in the making of this movie.
Oh and Maxim seems to finally notice that enormous hat.
2:01:09 This scene with the doctor is a bit of a snooze and we already covered the cancer revelations earlier. The one hot revelation – Rebecca used Mrs. Danvers name as her pseudonym! I’m sure they giggled about it together in their lingerie as Danvers brushed Rebecca’s hair one million times before bed. It does bring to mind the scene in Psycho where Marion Crane signs into the Bates Motel with a mixed-up version of her lover Sam’s name though. So do you think Alfred Hitchcock had a thing for mistaken and doubled identities or what?
2:06:56 Hitchcock Cameo! It comes right after George Sanders telephones Mrs. Danvers at Manderley and tells her she’s stuck with MDW forever. Camel’s Back, meet Final Straw. Maxim rushes home but he’s not faster than Mrs. Danvers who takes an ornate candelabra to some heavy drapes (at least one assumes that’s how she starts the blaze; it's the proper way). After momentarily wondering if they’d driven through a wormhole and come out on the other side of morning, they realize that light in the sky... that's Manderley!
Maxim: That’s not the Northern Lights! That’s Manderlay!
(The “Dun dun dun” is implied.) There’s some gorgeous day-for-night shooting here though that’s actually purposeful, since the gigantic house aflame is supposed to be lighting the world in that strange, spectral manner. Cue the grandeur of the moment being somewhat undercut by a miniature car bumping along in front of miniature house:
2:09:10 The Pair de Winter are reunited in front of their burning home and he paws at her face in that face-pawing way he has, which is supposed to mean love. MDW’s not wearing her hat, which makes me worry that it’s being engulfed in the flames – maybe that’s why Mrs. Danvers stays inside? She’s looking for the hat? Judith Anderson does the greatest full-body acting here though, showing us that Mrs. Danvers is totally convinced that all it takes to put out flames is the forceful jabbing of one’s elbows back and forth.
Adding fuel to the fire (sorry) for my theory that this movie is really Mrs. Danvers Movie is the fact that the movie ends with her end. She's the final ghost haunting Manderlay’s halls; the fire to Rebecca’s water – if only they could’ve been reunited, but all they could do is extinguish each other.
Related: recent Hitchcock news and three favorite Hitchcocks
[Thanks for reading our relay-style Rebecca party. Team Experience hopes you liked it. Maybe we'll do it again but which movie. Hmmm. Your final thoughts on Rebecca? There's always more to say with any prime Hitchcock, so do it in the comments, won't you? - Editor.]
Reader Comments (6)
Delightful windup to the relay view. I completely enjoyed the different perspectives on the pieces of the film, although I think all were in agreement that "I" was a timid mouse that just needed to grow a backbone and that Mrs. Danvers while perhaps evil incarnate was much more fun to hang out with. Somehow I'd forgotten George Sanders, quite correct he must always be referred to in full, was in this film, don't know how that happened since I love him and when he was young he was kind of sexy.
I'm off now to rewatch this with the fresh perspective in mind.
Would love to see the series continue maybe with something that's celebrating its 50th anniversary...The Great Race, Dr. Zhivago, Cat Ballou, Darling or Ship of Fools.
I second the motion, the 'Relay Race Retrospective' is a valuable new addition for any films that deserve some attention. The team provided lots of fun looking back at this classic.
As for "Rebecca" it was an interesting hybrid, a marriage of Hitchcock & Selznick stylistic touches.
When he first came to Hollywood Hitchcock was delighted with the budgets Selznick could provide, but he soon became disenchanted with the constrictions Selznick imposed.
His taste for crime couldn't be fully indulged until he became an independent producer.
You have whetted my appetite for a re-watch of Hitchcock and Ingrid Bergman...
Thanks to all.
Thanks for that, JA! Now I'm just waiting for the prequel, 'Rebecca & Mrs Danvers: In the Beginning'.
And you reminded me that I still need to read the Hitchcock/Truffaut book!
This has been a great series to read, and I love Jason's write-up. I used to love this movie back when I was a teenager, but I haven't watched it in at least a decade. All the write-ups seem to suggest that it's over-the-top, but in an enjoyable way that doesn't (always) veer into camp, so I think I'm due for a rewatch. I am also interested in seeing if Maxim comes across as a total dick this time around, when I was 15 I wasn't as good at identifying the asshole in the room.
Also - "Skyscrapers, hot dogs, inseams – Fassbender, Fassbender, Fassbender."
I see what you did there.
Selznick and Hitchcock really scored with this collab. They seemed to complement each other: Selznick's meticulous sense of style and taste combines well with Hitchcock's wryly subversive, dark bent. Their teaming hit paydirt again on Spellbound, which I think is terribly underrated. Yes, it's histrionic, but only in the best way, like only a really good melodrama can be.
It's crazy that David O. was able to follow up Gone With The Wind's burning of Atlanta with another incendiary setpiece. Can't be a coincidence--that guy never left anything to chance.
That Mrs. Danvers ran a tight ship. Too bad both oars weren't in the water.
"whenever I hear George Sanders' sweet mellifluous voice I think of Michael Fassbender"
I had the EXACT same thought when he first appeared, and then I immediately switched to Jean Dejardin and couldn't get him out of my mind for the rest of his scenes.