My Cousin Rachel
by Daphne du Maurier (novel) and Roger Michell (adaptation)
Fox Searchlight Pictures
Take Rachel Weisz, and the rugged landscape of Cornwall, and Sam Claflin in the role of a Gothic Heroine, and base it on a mindfuck from Daphne du Maurier, and you have a VERY pretty mindfuck of a movie.
Based on the book of the same name (reviewed by Carrie), this is directed by Roger Mitchell (he also directed Notting Hill and the 1995 Persuasion with Ciarán Hinds and Amanda Root).
Phillip is an orphan in the mid-19th century in Cornwall who grew up under the guardianship of his cousin Ambrose. Ambrose became ill, went to Italy for the climate, and in the course of his letters, he mentions that “my cousin Rachel” appeared, and she is a delightful creature in all ways, and then, surprise surprise, he writes that they’ve gotten married! Then Phillip gets a letter that Ambrose saying that Rachel isn’t letting him send letters and he has these headaches and is generally paranoid.
Phillip travels to Italy to discover that Ambrose has died, Rachel decamped right after the funeral, and he will inherit the entire estate on his 25th birthday. Ambrose’s will was never updated to include anything for Rachel. Rachel eventually shows up, and the relationship between her and the very young Phillip gets complicated.
Rounding out the cast is Iain Glen and Holliday Grainger as Phillip’s godfather Nick, and Nick’s daughter (Phillip’s Godsister?) Louise. I’ve loved Iain Glen since he was the bad guy in the first Tomb Raider movie and I love his voice SO VERY MUCH. Holliday Grainger has had a solid career, and I have an unsubstantiated theory about her character. (See spoilers below.)
There are two really interesting things about this movie. The first is that there is a gothic heroine, and it’s not Rachel. It’s Phillip. He’s in this big house where someone may or may not be trying to kill him for his money, he’s running around with a candle a lot, just not in a big nightgown with poofy sleeves. He’s the one that’s caught in this web, not Rachel.
The second is the total ambiguity. Did Rachel murder Ambrose? Is she trying to murder Phillip? What’s her actual motive? What’s the name of her dressmaker that makes those beautiful pleats in her skirts? The movie, like the book (I’m told- I haven’t read it yet), makes no statement on the answers. There’s plenty of shady shit happening, but also reasonable(ish) explanations for all of it.
I would love to sit down with Rachel Weisz and talk with her about her approach to playing Rachel. (I mean, look, I would love to sit down with Rachel Weisz and talk with her about anything, after I told her how formative and important Evie Carnahan was for me, and ask what it’s like to have Daniel Craig as her trophy husband.) I tried to figure out if she had made a decision as an actor whether Rachel was a murdering golddigger. I don’t think she did, and I think (upon further reflection) that if she had, it would have broken the ambiguity. But I want to know how she broke down the motivations and objectives in each scene. As you know, I’m fascinated by the craft of acting, and this seems like a really difficult role to get right. I’m so happy they gave it to someone of Weisz’s caliber.
Sam Claflin has done okay for himself. He was pretty good in the Hunger Games movies, and did his best with Me Before You, but he’s really good in a melodrama. He goes through several phases as he first hates Rachel, then loves her, then begins to suspect her, then goes into full paranoia (also it’s flat out there on screen that he’s bad at actual sex, which is not a surprise).
Holliday Grainger’s Louise is also an interesting character study. She’s known Phillip her entire life, and she’s clearly been waiting for him to get his head out of his ass and marry her. She’s had some interesting roles herself, and I love her.
This is a good movie for people who liked Crimson Peak, or Far From the Madding Crowd (or just really wanted a blend of those two movies). I also hear that there are a couple of literary retellings of du Maurier’s Rebecca coming out. It’ll be fun to see what else comes out of the potential Gothic revival I keep hearing mutterings about.
My Cousin Rachel is in theaters now and tickets (US) are available at Fandango and Moviefone.
Read the book in high school (read all of Du Maurier) so didn’t remember any of it but the title. Saw the movie last weekend and found it fascinating. So I read the spoiler and I think you have a point, Redheadedgirl. Louise was a little too smart and smug for Phillip’s good.
I read an article from Cosmo where Rachael Weisz said that she decided for herself whether Rachel was innocent or guilty and commited to her decision for the entire performance but would not even tell the director what she’d chosen. Which is so cool.
As I remember in the book Rachael’s last words as she’s dying add yet another layer of ambiguity to the plot and I’m sorry that they skipped that little twist in the movie. Overall it was a beautifully filmed and well acted movie. Costumes, cinematography and settings will surely get nominated for academy awards.
Aside: the open flames in this movie (fireplaces, candles) get really close to long skirts, bed curtains, etc. One dramatic scene I was so busy watching the flame of the candle come scarily close to the bed curtains that I missed part of the tension. My husband wasn’t familiar with the book and was convinced that the ending was going to be the house burning down.
@RHG:
Have you seen the 1950’s version with Olivia De Havilland as Rachel and Richard Burton as Phillip? Haven’t seen it, but I did see online reviews of it, and that’s how I ever heard of the book and movie. Related though, I did see the adaptation of Rebecca with Joan Fontaine, De Havilland’s sister, as the unnamed second Mrs. De Winter and really liked it.
didn’t remember any of it but the title
It is memorable, isn’t it? A while back, I read an obscure 19th-century novel whose narrator has a relative named Rachel; she almost always refers to her as “my cousin Rachel”. I had to wonder if Daphne du Maurier had come across the same obscure novel in her youth, and the phrase stuck in her mind too.
On the other hand: Whew. When the current movie first came out, I found a string of reviews that single-mindedly obsessed on the “my cousin” of the title, as if there was some kind of incest plot. At the time I couldn’t be sure if the director had egregiously changed the story, or if the reviewers simply hadn’t watched the movie. Now I know.
Team Evie Carnahan forever (though that movie is problematic as fuck)!
Dude, Rebecca haunts and terrifies me, to the point I have never reread the book though I have multiple copies.
The magic is in that first reading.
I’m dying to see My Cousin Rachel and the minute I found out Rachel Weisz was in it I knew it would be brilliant. I love a mystery that’s not solved, so I can’t wait to see this.
I only vaguely remember Olivia de Havilland as Rachel. (I think Richard Burton’s bewildered Phillip made a greater impression on me.) I expect that Rachel Weisz would do a much better job. I look forward to seeing this.
By the way, It’s Dame Olivia now. 🙂
By the way, It’s Dame Olivia now
And she is one hundred years old, woo hoo. (So is writer Beverly Cleary.) Funny thing is: if I’d been asked, a few decades ago, which of the sisters would hit 100, I’d have bet on Joan Fontaine.
Rebecca haunts and terrifies me, to the point I have never reread the book though I have multiple copies
I never read the book until many, many years after seeing the movie. I was surprised at how very little they changed, while still making it Hollywood-plot-acceptable. (Mrs. Danvers’ fate doesn’t count. Artistic license.)
I love watching movies where one of the actors knows something that the other actors don’t and acts it accordingly. The only other one I know of is the movie Doubt, where Philip Seymour Hoffman knew whether the priest was guilty and the other actors did not (which is also how they handle the stage play.)
I’d never heard of My Cousin Rachel before but the trailer immediately made me excited because Rachel Weisz and Crimson Peak vibes.
@Hazel and Louise:
O wow! How fancy.
@Louise:
I didn’t take bets on who hit 100, but I did wonder which one would die first. Sounds a bit morbid I know, but I remembered reading that their mom had hit 100 before dying.
I love watching movies where one of the actors knows something that the other actors don’t and acts it accordingly.
Silent-movie actress Louise Brooks wrote about playing a scene where she is wearing nothing but a fluffy bathrobe, nothing underneath. She asked the director what difference it made, why it mattered what she’s wearing or not wearing: “Who would know?” He said: “You will know.”
I had read that Joan Fontaine stated it would be “just her luck” to die first. Seeing as she won the 1st Oscar, she got married first and she had a baby first.