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Rebecca



Romance becomes psychodrama in Alfred Hitchcock's elegantly crafted Rebecca, his first foray into Hollywood filmmaking. A dreamlike adaptation of Daphne du Maurier's 1938 novel, the film stars the enchanting Joan Fontaine as a young woman who believes she has found her heart's desire when she marries the dashing aristocratic widower Maxim de Winter (played with cunning vulnerability by Laurence Olivier). But upon moving to Manderley—her groom's baroque ancestral mansion—she soon learns that his deceased wife haunts not only the home but the temperamental, brooding Maxim as well. The start of Hitchcock's legendary collaboration with producer David O. Selznick, this elegiac gothic vision, captured in stunning black and white by George Barnes, took home the Academy Awards for best picture and best cinematography.

SPECIAL FEATURES

• New 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray
• Audio commentary from 1990 featuring film scholar Leonard J. Leff
• Isolated music and effects track
• New conversation between film critic and author Molly Haskell and scholar Patricia White
• New interview with special effects historian Craig Barron on the visual effects in Rebecca
• Documentary from 2007 on the making of Rebecca
• Screen, hair, makeup, and costume tests including actors Joan Fontaine, Anne Baxter, Vivien Leigh, Margaret Sullavan, and Loretta Young
• Casting gallery annotated by director Alfred Hitchcock and producer David O. Selznick
• Television interviews with Hitchcock and Fontaine from 1973 and 1980
• Audio interviews from 1986 with actor Judith Anderson and Fontaine
• Three radio adaptations of Rebecca, from 1938, 1941, and 1950, including Orson Welles's version for the Mercury Theatre
• Theatrical rerelease trailer
• PLUS: An essay by critic and Selznick biographer David Thomson and selected production correspondence, including letters between Hitchcock and Selznick

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Spellbound



Dr. Constance Petersen (Ingrid Bergman) is a psychiatrist with a firm understanding of human nature—or so she thinks. When the mysterious Dr. Anthony Edwardes (Gregory Peck) becomes the new chief of staff at her institution, the bookish and detached Constance plummets into a whirlwind of tangled identities and feverish psychoanalysis, where the greatest risk is to fall in love. A transcendent love story replete with taut excitement and startling imagery, Spellbound is classic Hitchcock, featuring stunning performances, an Academy Award®-winning score by Miklos Rozsa, and a captivating dream sequence by Surrealist icon Salvador Dalí.

SPECIAL FEATURES

• Spectacular new digital transfer with film and sound restoration, including rare theater entrance and exit music cues by composer Miklos Rozsa
• Commentary by Hitchcock scholar Marian Keane
• "A Nightmare Ordered by Telephone," an in-depth, illustrated essay on the Salvador Dalí-designed dream sequence by James Bigwood
• Excerpts from a 1973 audio interview with composer Miklos Rozsa
• Complete 1948 Lux Radio Theatre adaptation starring Joseph Cotten and Alida Valli
• The Fishko Files: a WNYC/New York Public Radio piece on the theremin
• Essays by noted Hitchcock scholars Lesley Brill (The Hitchcock Romance) and Leonard Leff (Hitchcock and Selznick)
• Hundreds of behind-the-scenes photos and documents chronicling the film's production, from set photos to ads, posters, and publicity material
• Theatrical trailer
• Optimal image quality: RSDL dual-layer edition
• English subtitles for the deaf and hearing-impaired

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Notorious



With this twisting love story, Alfred Hitchcock summoned darker shades of suspense and passion by casting two of Hollywood's most beloved stars starkly against type. Ingrid Bergman stars as Alicia, an alluring woman of ill repute recruited by Devlin (Cary Grant), a suave but mysterious intelligence agent, to spy for the U.S. Only after she has fallen for Devlin does she learn that her mission is to seduce a Nazi industrialist (Claude Rains) hiding out in South America. Coupling inventive cinematography with brilliantly subtle turns from his mesmerizing leads, Hitchcock orchestrates an anguished romance shot through with deception and moral ambiguity. A thriller of rare perfection, Notorious represents a pinnacle in both its director's legendary career and the pantheon of classic Hollywood cinema.

SPECIAL FEATURES

• New 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray
• Audio commentaries from 1990 and 2001 featuring Alfred Hitchcock scholar Marian Keane and film historian Rudy Behlmer
• New interview with Hitchcock biographer Donald Spoto
• New program about the film's visuals with cinematographer John Bailey
• New scene analysis by film scholar David Bordwell
• Once Upon a Time..."Notorious," a 2009 documentary about the film featuring actor Isabella Rossellini; filmmakers Peter Bogdanovich, Claude Chabrol, and Stephen Frears; and others
• New program about Hitchcock's storyboarding and previsualization process by filmmaker Daniel Raim
• 1948 newsreel footage of actor Ingrid Bergman and Hitchcock
• 1948 Lux Radio Theatre adaptation of Notorious, starring Bergman and Joseph Cotten
• Trailers and teasers
• PLUS: An essay by critic Angelica Jade Bastién

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Just watched Rebecca again the other night and everytime I do that I find it amazing how you can have a whole film where you never know the name of the main actress who is onscreen for the most part of the film's duration while at the same time you cannot help but hear and think and visualize another woman whose name is constantly repeated throughout but never makes a single apparition: Rebecca.

A real masterstroke, no less.

Has anybody listened to the radio programs included on Disc 2? I know I've had mine almost a year and a half and I haven't waded through them yet...

Annie Mall wrote: whole film where you never know the name of the main actress who is onscreen for the most part of the film's duration while at the same time you cannot help but hear and think and visualize another woman whose name is constantly repeated throughout but never makes a single apparition: Rebecca.

Yes I like that as well. The presence of Rebecca is so powerful that people remember her after death, while the lack of "I"'s name suggests that she finds it difficult to make an impression on people face to face, let alone make a lasting impression. The scene where she is wearing the dress is the climax of this - her personality is completely subsumed to Rebecca's, at least to the people who see her in the dress, like Maxim. Maxim probably was attracted to this easily moudled character, he probably had enough of strong willed women with Rebecca, so it perhaps is tragic that he does not realise that by taking her back to Manderley he forces her into competition with Rebecca for his attention (if not for his love as "I" thinks). Then when she starts fighting for her individuality, he realises he has killed what he married "I" for, maybe created if not another Rebecca, then at least someone who will not just sit around in a large house and wait for her husband to come home to her (as shown by "I"'s insistence on going to the inquest).

I've just finished the second disc and thought the radio programmes were very interesting. They gave the opportunity for different combinations of actors and actresses to have a go at playing the role. After listening to the Margaret Sullavan production, I think it shows even more than in the screentest that she didn't seem fragile enough for the role. I wasn't that fond of the Orson Welles performance either, but I was amazed to think of the influence this film had over parts of Citizen Kane in the rest of the extras on the disc - it had never occured to me before, but now seems so obvious!

The Mercury Theater production seemed to be having a lot more fun with the play though, especially with Welles flirting a little with Sullavan, the obviously staged questions which the pair were having fun with ("why yes, I've been wondering that as well!") and the 'tactful' way in which Du Maurier cut off the telephone connection after being questioned about why "I" had no name! Perhaps the three of them were having a joke about the inane questions people ask of an author!

I actually like the Ronald Coleman and Ida Lupino version best out of all the adaptations, even the film itself. I can see why Selznick tried to get Coleman for the film, as he seems to be able to play the character of De Winter more naturally.

Also it was interesting to see Isaac Mizrahi credited with Julia Jones in the production of the original Laserdisc. Is this the same Isaac Mizrahi who is the fashion designer profiled in the documentary Unzipped? That might perhaps explain the sections relating to the costume, hair and makeup tests on the DVD as it would have been an area with which he was more interested?

Notorious discussed on this Out of the Past podcast.

Not that it is any BIG or NEW news, but I asked Turell if there was any chance of Rebecca coming back in print, and the obvious answer was no, as much as he would like to.

LightBulbFilm wrote:Not that it is any BIG or NEW news, but I asked Turell if there was any chance of Rebecca coming back in print, and the obvious answer was no, as much as he would like to.

Why not??

I'm sure whoever owns the rights wised up and are now asking for more money to re-license.

LightBulbFilm wrote:
Not that it is any BIG or NEW news, but I asked Turell if there was any chance of Rebecca coming back in print, and the obvious answer was no, as much as he would like to.

Why not??

I'd imagine because the rights would be too expensive. Hitchcock sells, so whoever has it isn't likely to forfeit the rights since they could make more money hawking it on their own.

MGM currently own the rights, sublicensed from ABC/Disney. Since Criterion got House of Games and, one imagines, Salo from MGM, they probably asked about this at the time and were told, sorry, nope.

Narshty wrote:MGM currently own the rights, sublicensed from ABC/Disney. Since Criterion got House of Games and, one imagines, Salo from MGM, they probably asked about this at the time and were told, sorry, nope.

Makes one wonder why MGM hasn't come out with their own editions like with Straw Dogs. Feature-laden or not, these titles deserve to be in-print in R1.

I have no idea how feasible it would be but maybe Criterion could license their Hitch supplements to MGM in return for a handful of their back catalog titles? Seems like it would be win-win for everyone.

I guess it's about time some mod comes and redirects you guys to the MGM thread.

Narshty wrote:MGM currently own the rights, sublicensed from ABC/Disney. Since Criterion got House of Games and, one imagines, Salo from MGM, they probably asked about this at the time and were told, sorry, nope.

I just read that that sub license is due to end 'in a few months', and maybe that's the fly in the ointment? Be nice if Criterion could get a hold of a few of those ABC/Disney held titles, not only the Hitchcocks again, but Criterions of 'Hell In The Pacific' and 'Junior Bonner' would be nice.

Interesting... I ordered one, we'll see...

zombeaner wrote:Interesting... I ordered one, we'll see...

After the Bensonsworld fiasco, and while I still have Drunken Angel "pending despatch" from CD-WOW, I'll sit this one out. But it's fascinating, and I'd love to hear how it turns out!

fiddlesticks wrote:

zombeaner wrote:Interesting... I ordered one, we'll see...

After the Bensonsworld fiasco, and while I still have Drunken Angel "pending despatch" from CD-WOW, I'll sit this one out. But it's fascinating, and I'd love to hear how it turns out!

I'll let you know.

Went ahead and took a chance. I mean, what's the worst that could happen, they don't charge your card until it ships anyways rite

I ordered also, so I'll chime in as well. What has been the experience with CD WOW! ?

Just ordered this late last night and it's not yet showing up under my orders when I log in with my order num and email, which has me thus far a little annoyed with them...Might be premature to assume anything strange though. Got confirmation emails, so hopefully all's well, hehe. Like domino, I'm not too concerned. This would be cool if we found a place with a stockpile of these for any interested.

There's a 33-page thread on CD-Wow in the Stores forum, but basically, there's a 50-50 chance we'd get what we ordered even if it was something readily available. But I've never really had any problems with them yet so hopefully I'll keep my luck. They do occasionally get OOP titles in stock (Savage Innocents comes to mind), it could work out. But I don't have my hopes up, I'm really only ordering because I'd be more upset if it worked out for others than I would be if I didn't get it.

Ivy Mike wrote:I ordered also, so I'll chime in as well. What has been the experience with CD WOW! ?

Just ordered this late last night and it's not yet showing up under my orders when I log in with my order num and email, which has me thus far a little annoyed with them...Might be premature to assume anything strange though. Got confirmation emails, so hopefully all's well, hehe. Like domino, I'm not too concerned. This would be cool if we found a place with a stockpile of these for any interested.

If you ordered from the US site (cd-wow.us), your order won't show up there. To check order status you need to go to the parent/UK site, cd-wow.com. Don't ask me why; it's just one of those things that make shopping at CD-Wow such wonderful, quirky experience.

I'm broke right now, and Spellbound is one of my favorite Hitchcock films. For some reason, I doubt this is legit though.

I'm sure everyone who ordered figured this out, but they removed the item without refunding/canceling the order-- so if you ordered this, you've already been charged and though your order says "pending" it's of course not-- you need to email CD-Wow and request a refund

domino harvey wrote:I'm sure everyone who ordered figured this out, but they removed the item without refunding/canceling the order-- so if you ordered this, you've already been charged and though your order says "pending" it's of course not-- you need to email CD-Wow and request a refund

I got an email saying the order was canceled and that they have refunded the amount.

broadwayrock wrote:

domino harvey wrote:I'm sure everyone who ordered figured this out, but they removed the item without refunding/canceling the order-- so if you ordered this, you've already been charged and though your order says "pending" it's of course not-- you need to email CD-Wow and request a refund

I got an email saying the order was canceled and that they have refunded the amount.

Maybe I shouldn't have made so many disparaging remarks about CD-Wow's mother