I love the escapism in Netflix’s ‘Rebecca’ – but we all know who the leading man should have been

The far too youthful Armie Hammer seems to have been cast to appeal to young Americans, writes Jenny Eclair, but I can think of the perfect replacement

Armie Hammer and Lily James in ‘Rebecca’ (Netflix)

So the reviews are out for the latest Netflix adaptation of Daphne Du Maurier’s much-loved novel Rebecca – and the results aren’t good. Comments range from the leads being described as “planks of wood” and “pallid” to “overdressed and underpowered”. Oh dear.  

Poor old Lily James, who plays the second Mrs De Winter, has already received a public kicking recently due to her hugely ill-advised dalliance with  Dominic West, a kiss that was flung all over the papers in good old fashioned News of The World fashion and culminated in a strange Eighties-style garden gate statement from Mr and Mrs West insisting their marriage is “strong”. David Mellor and Antonia De Sancha anyone?

Hmmm, I have no idea why I felt so personally disappointed in West and James, it’s not as if I know either of them, but I think the fact they took their masks off to snog on the plane (allegedly) really riled me up. Have your fun by all means, but surely pandemic rules should still apply in public?

But let’s put that nonsense to one side for the time being. People make mistakes and muck up their marriages all the time, some survive and some don’t, and really it’s none of our business. So, let’s get back to the film.

Starting with the bad news, the leading actor playing Maxim de Winter isn’t quite right. Rebecca has opted for a big blond American boy, a Gatsby-alike, with millennial white teeth and a ridiculous gold suit that clashes with his gold Bentley. Armie Hammer is a terrible piece of casting. Though it was presumably a choice meant to attract an American audience to a story that doesn’t really mean that much to them, this is not what an English gentleman would wear.

It’s a shame that such a central character should be so wrong, but the rest of the cast is much more suitable, with a particularly great turn by Kristin Scott Thomas who is the most beautifully dressed Mrs Danvers to ever grace the screen, which brings me neatly to the most pressing reason to watch this latest incarnation. It’s visually stunning; watching Rebecca is like taking your eyes on holiday.

As many of us know, the story begins in Monte Carlo and for those of us watching in a grey and miserable tier 2 London, it instantly transports one from the sofa directly to the French Riviera – and for the first 25 minutes we can soak up some delicious sunshine and outrageous luxury. Oh, the hotel suites and staircases, the lunches on the terrace, the silver trays of oysters on ice.  

Like so many of us, I haven’t managed a trip abroad this year and have seriously missed that feeling of being somewhere completely foreign and really hot. I have also missed going to really posh places, even just to use the loos. I once spent one of the best days of my life popping in and out of the smartest Miami beachfront hotels treating myself to various cups of tea and diet cokes. Let’s face it, its hard to break the bank when you don’t order more than a club sandwich.  

A dose of how the other half live can be good for the soul, and this latest adaptation is sumptuous to the point of vulgarity – and I enjoyed every over-the-top shot.

Once the story takes us back to England we lose some of the sunshine, but there are many other visual treats to be had, not least the clothes.

I have never coveted so many blouses in a film; everything Lily James wears is utterly gorgeous, and if I was on the board of Marks & Spencer I would be attempting to save the brand right now by ripping off the pretty Thirties blouse look and knocking them out in every size and colour possible. In fact, visiting a shockingly deserted Marks in Oxford St last week was one of the main reasons why I loved watching Rebecca so much. It provided the perfect antidote to the ongoing dreariness of a seemingly never-ending pandemic. As for the interior shots of the first Mrs Winters’ boudoir, I genuinely think I heard myself purring like a giant Siamese cat.

Rebecca is pure escapism. For purists it’s not going to work, too many liberties are taken with the book and this includes the demise of Mrs Danvers, an extra twist that deliberately strays from Du Maurier’s original story. Personally, I could cope with all the tweaks. I didn’t even mind when whole chunks of Cornwall looked more like Lyme Regis; for around two hours I wasn’t in 2020, I was elsewhere, in a faraway Covid-free land, and boy did I enjoy every minute.

Back to reality, and I’ve been racking my brains thinking who could have made a more convincing leading man than the weirdly toothpaste brand-sounding and far too youthful Armie Hammer? In the book, Maxim is 20 years older than the second Mrs De Winter and hence, unfortunately, the only name that keeps coming back to me as a possible option is Dominic West – but let’s just pretend I didn’t say that.