This is the question that many moviegoers ask themselves on January 1st: how to start the movie year in the best way possible? With a comfort movie, a sure bet to help you digest the holidays? Have you caught one of the many new releases hitting theaters? Or by (re)discovering the classics? Thanks to Ciné Sorbonne, you can choose this third option by delving into Alfred Hitchcock’s filmography.
A director who is rightly described as “suspension master”And of which we can more easily cite Psychose, Fenêtre sur cours, La Mort aux trouses, Sueurs bleues or Les Oiseaux when it comes to his works. This is not controversial, since they are among the peaks of the filmmaker, whose fourteen opuses receive an average of more than or equal to 4 out of 5 among AlloCiné Internet users.
Rebecca and The Chained are among them, and it is worth taking advantage of their theatrical release to (re)see these romantic thrillers, which are not only among Alfred Hitchcock’s best films, but also two of his best films. beautiful.
Rebecca (1940)
Because of World War II, Rebecca was released in theaters on May 22, 1947, and the French public discovered it seven years later than the Americans, even though it had already won two Oscars (Best Picture and Best Picture) and the director was done. His tumultuous collaboration with producer David O. Selznick (responsible for Gone with the Wind on Chaos), began with this feature film, the first to be made in Hollywood by an English filmmaker.
which marks the second of three adaptations of Daphne du Maurier’s novel, after Jamaica Tavern and Before The Birds. Alfred Hitchcock produces a thriller with romantic and gothic accents, whose quality of atmosphere and tension and mastery of space has lost nothing as the film celebrates its 85th anniversary this year.
Contrary to what one might think, Rebecca is not the name of the heroine played by Joan Fontaine (whom we never get to know), but the name of the previous wife of Maximilian de Winter (Laurent Olivier), who remarries a young woman he met. in the south of France, when it seemed that he was on the verge of committing suicide by throwing himself off a cliff.
Without going into fantasy, Rebecca quickly becomes a ghost story in the imposing (and disturbing) Manderley house. A thriller in which one of the main characters is conspicuous by his absence, physically speaking, but seemingly always present, through The deceased’s belongings, his room left untouched, or the hostility shown by his housekeeper and former confidante. Danvers (Judith Anderson) to the new lady. De winter.
Laurence Olivier offered the role to his then-partner Vivien Leigh, wanting the role, and Joan Fontaine made his frustrations clear by being uncomfortable with her on set. Much to the delight of Alfred Hitchcock, who used this coldness to emphasize the isolation of the heroine, whose fragility is heightened by her sense of never being at home in Manderley. Psychological suspense, compounded by deceptive appearances and suspicions about Rebecca’s disappearance.
As is often the case with Alfred Hitchcock, the result is not an end in itself, so much so that the feature film remains as attractive as ever when we return to it (and we can hardly imagine its atmosphere in the darkness of the cinema room. ). And Rebecca remains all the more fascinating when we place it in the author’s filmography, for which it was a transitional opus between England and the United States.

While Manderley’s way of filming mirrors the home of Norman Bates and his mother in Psycho, the film marks the author’s turn to opuses where suspense is imbued with images of stunning beauty. 85 years after its release, Rebecca remains a pillar that Ben Wheatley tried to tackle (by playing the book-re-reading card) with Lily James and Armie Hammer.
If almost no one remembers his version, it is not only because the actor was put in the closet because of accusations of sexism and sexual abuse against him.
Chained (1946)
First released in our cinemas on May 16, 1948, Les Enchaînés was also the subject of a remake in 1992. In the form of a TV movie, which we will cover modestly, despite the presence of Jean-Pierre. Cassel as the villain, previously played by Claude Rains (Casablanca, The Invisible Man), to better focus on the original. Because he returned to cinema, but not only.
Another studio-sold feature film celebrates Alfred Hitchcock and David O. At the end of such a tumultuous association between the Selznicks, there is a very close resemblance between the shelter of Dr. Edwards’ house and the residence that accompanies the logo of the company Selznick International. According to many observers, the images are nothing more than a coincidence.

Starting with Rebecca (the only opus in his career where the filmmaker was excluded from the scriptwriting process), the story of disappointment ends with These Chained. The title of which is not a barely veiled reference to the contract binding Hitchcock to Selznick, as it is a very loose translation. Notorious The original, which refers to someone infamous.
Like Alicia, the daughter of a Nazi secret agent involved in an anti-American plot who leads a debauched life but finds an opportunity to redeem herself by working in the United States and marrying her father’s former friend to spy on him. . A double deal that gets a little more complicated when she and her recruit Devlin fall in love and can’t admit it to each other or the mission fails.
Four years after Michael Curtiz’s Casablanca, Alfred Hitchcock also mixes espionage and a failed love story against the backdrop of World War II (even if the story takes place just after that) and the presence of Claude Rains and Ingrid Bergman in front of the camera. It not only strengthens this closeness… which does not go further. Because Les Enchaînés remains the sacred film of its author. A quasi-seminal opus to the extent that, even more so than Rebecca and its more pronounced gothic atmosphere, it remains the foundation of the aesthetic that would later make it successful.
According to François Truffaut, it was his best black-and-white film, but its influence goes beyond the screen frames on which Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant exchange kisses with whispers and dialogue (bypassing the Hayes Code, censorship). of the time, which stipulated that two actors should not kiss for more than three seconds in a row).
We certainly find a pattern of it in many films. And in particular, two episodes of the Mission Impossible saga: the second, directed by John Woo and, above all, Hitchcock’s Rogue Nation, which was also inspired by the finale of The Man Who Knew Too Much for one of its best sequences. It features Rebecca Ferguson, who has been repeatedly compared to her compatriot Ingrid Bergman.

77 years after its first appearance in French cinemas, Les Enchaînés returns to French cinemas. It continues to fascinate and captivate us, even in its finale, with a mixture of relentless suspense (the key scene remains a stage model) and maddening elegance that owes as much to the beauty of its black and white as its two leading actors. .
If Alfred Hitchcock’s work includes its share of iconic couples, the work created by Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant is certainly not behind the pack. And, like Rebecca, looking at this opus, which combines its elements in perfect balance, allows us to see that it already contains many things that will continue to establish its importance in the history of cinema, with long films. of which this, though less often referred to, is nothing to be envied.
Source: Allocine

Rose James is a Gossipify movie and series reviewer known for her in-depth analysis and unique perspective on the latest releases. With a background in film studies, she provides engaging and informative reviews, and keeps readers up to date with industry trends and emerging talents.