Unreliable Rebecca

Probably the most striking thing about the film 'Rebecca' is that the
entire story is, after an initial dream sequence, one long flashback.

To appreciate the film properly then (and this is far from as easy as
it sounds), the viewer needs to keep this simple fact in mind .. if
they do, they will then keep conscious of the fact that there exist all
the expected 'unreliable narrator' issues, not least in the cottage
scene (a scene which does have that added sublime complication of
another character, Maxim, relating -- to the film's narrator/relator --
a story, the story of the so-called 'real Rebecca').

Slow as I probably am, the existence of this complication ('Rebecca''s
unreliable narrator) only hit me last year and since, I've become more
and more convinced that we, the audience, are not to take all or indeed
anything that happens in 'Rebecca' at face value .. for me now, all the
central character's concerns need not necessarily be wholly warranted,
e.g. if the story were told objectively, Mrs. Danvers might not be as
sinister as she seems, Mrs. Van Hopper might not be as vulgar and cruel
as she seems, Maxim might not be the wonderful and charming gent he's
made out to be and Rebecca herself need not necessarily have been as
tyrannical and hateful as she's painted. Of course, I do believe that
all these characters would appear as they do in 'Rebecca' if the
storyteller was a very young and very insecure woman.

Fergal #.