One, why did we never see what Rebecca looked like? There should have been a photograph or a painting of her in the movie. Everyone described her as being so beautiful why was the audience cheating from seeing what she looked like?
Two why wasn't Maxim charged with something? He didn't murder her but it wasn't suicide either. He did put her body on the boat and sink it to cover up what happened. That has to be some kind of offense.
1. I presume Max hated her so much he didn't want any images of her around reminding him of her
2. The Police thought that when she found the news she just went and killed herself with Max having any involvement
Sorry but did you even watch the film? Maxim being exonerated was clearly explained - the police thought Rebecca committed suicide after learning she was dying of cancer.
And not seeing Rebecca is the whole point. The second Mrs de Winter never sees what she looks like either; she only hears about how beautiful and perfect she was, and therefore so does the audience. Not knowing drives her own insecurities. Imagine if a portrait of Rebecca or a flashback had been included: some people would undoubtedly have been saying "is that it? She's not even that attractive" - and that would shatter the idea of an unseen perfect beauty.
Even on the boards of the most beautiful actresses of all time (Leigh, Lamarr, Kelly, Hepburn, Tierney) there are people criticising them for being overrated. The minute "Rebecca" is thought to be overrated, our sympathy for Mrs de Winter ends, as she would become worried and insecure about someone we can criticise.
There is a scene where Max comes back from being away for a while and Mrs. de Winter is excited to see him and asks if they can have a costume party. He agrees and she is shown making drawings of various costumes she would wear and scribbles out what looks like a Joan of Arc sketch. The scribbling flows up and down and angled across the legs. Maybe a hint at the ending fire scene.
She has been in the sealed off west wing of the mansion and Mrs. Danvers comes in and gives her a tour. At the bottom of the stairs there is a huge painting of Rebecca in a flowing gown and hat. We don't see it up close enough to see things like eye color but good enough to know Rebecca was beautiful and I thought she looked a lot like Joan Fontaine in that painting. I was not sure if the painting was Rebecca but it is clarified later.
When Mrs. de Winter makes her entrance at the costume party, Max almost faints and tells her to leave and to never dress like that again. She is wearing the same dress and hat as the one in the painting. Then the ever stealthy Mrs. Danvers appears and says to Mrs. de Winter, "I remember when she wore that dress, I remember how she walked down those stairs, and I knew how Max would react to seeing you in it". That may not be the exact quote but it is close enough to know that Mrs. Danvers is more devious than what we already think.
Because it was a long film, I had to watch it twice in order to get some of the parts I missed the first time. And I came to the chat boards to get some help before the 2nd viewing. Hitchcock films usually have a lot of dialog that can go with some very minute detail. He did that on purpose and sometimes it was a red herring to get you side tracked.
I did not even think about the above mentioned Joan of Arc drawing and fire ending scene on the first watch. How could I know? I hadn't seen the end yet.
Another person has already replied about how he got out of his involvment in hiding Rebecca's body.
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Just try to stay alive and see what the next minute brings.
The painting is *not* Rebecca. It is an ancestor of Maxim's (Lady Caroline de Winter in the book). The connection with Rebecca is that in the last costume ball at Manderley before her death, Rebecca dressed up as the lady in the portrait, which Danvers then encourages the heroine to do too.
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