Analysis of a Hollywood classic movie: Rebecca by Alfred Hitchcock, 1940
Rebecca, is a magnificent film by the great English film director, Alfred Hitchcock, was also his first film shot in the United States. The genre of this film can be said that it is inherited from the literary genres, as it is based on the novel by the London writer, Daphne du Maurier.
In the movie Rebecca, one of the film genres that occur in Hollywood during the 30s, the terror is used. In this film Hitchcock shows us this type of gender because it is about what fear is, through suspense.
The use of different techniques by Hitchcock makes us get into that world;For example, at the beginning of the film it already shows us a dreary place with fog, a plane of the full moon that could refer to the night where the monsters and more ghosts come out, with dark plans and the faint lighting of a large mansion inruins, Manderley.
Likewise, fear is represented by the housewife itself, Mrs. Danvers, this character could identify with the darkness of the mansion, serious and static, always dressed in black. In the film it should be noted that sometimes fear is what is not seen, as we can appreciate throughout the film with Mrs. Danvers, always stealthy without knowing where it appears or where it is, almost without moving, likeIf it were a ghost that lives the mansion. Like the great unknown of how Rebecca had died, the first wife of the Lord of Winter, present in the film, but that never appears in a physical body, always named and remembered, especially by Mrs. Danvers.
In turn, there is something deafening on the coast, the sea, the waves breaking against the rocks, the house near the sea, full of secrets that everyone hides. This theme is very recurrent in the film, because the supposed cause for which Rebecca died is that he drowned when he was sailing. Everyone knows what happened in the mansion except the new lady of Winter, an innocent young woman, of which nobody knows her name. All act in a mysterious way, tormenting the young woman. One of the most scary moments is when Danvers instigates the new lady of Winter to commit various barbarities, such as committing suicide.
The desire of the housekeeper not wanting to see the Lord of Winter being happy with another woman, different from Rebecca, she is finally fulfilled in Mandley, appearing in the movie a image Mrs. Danvers with a candle inside the mansion, where moments later it is wrapped in flames, remaining in it until the house collapses on it.
In conclusion, within the cinematographic genres of Hollywood cinema the one that is closest to this film is that of terror, by exclusion of others (Western, musical, comedy, etc.) by not resembling any of them. Rebecca, like the other Hitchcock films belong to the fear genre. This can be seen through the use of first planes, which show us a dramatic end;The plot, in this case it is about whether the Lord of Winter has killed his first wife, Rebecca, or on the contrary she has committed suicide, assumptions that did not occur, because her death really was because of an accident. Also, the different characters that hide this secret, generate great concern, being the one that most fear produces that of Mrs. Danvers. All this linked to landscapes and sound cause a feeling of fear and suspense, resulting in a part of the horror genre.
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