This is an excellent adaptation of the Daphne De Maurier novel and the casting is very well done. Olivia de Havilland is excellent in the role of Rachel. Rex Harrison in his first US film is a young vibrant Philip Ashley. Any confusion with another man Olivia was married to in GWTW should be discarded. As the film starts, Philip is getting mystery letters from Rachel husband, his brother, that Rachel is killing him. The letters are so strange he makes as quick a trip as possible to his Italian Villa. By the time he arrives, it is too late, his brother is dead. When he meets Rachel, the letters have already given him a negative view of her. Then her beauty and plotting wins him over. His brother has left Philip the entire estate.Then Rachel starts to seduce him and manages to take everything Philip has inherited from him. Philip takes ill, and begins to suspect Rachel has something to do with his problems. This film smartly leaves it to the viewer to decide if Rachel was playing him and trying to kill him or not and the film plays the viewer to a lot of wonder as to who is doing what.

This film is based on one of Daphne DuMaurier's mysterious romances and features one of her most intriguing female characters. Olivia de Havilland as Rachel comes across as an anti- heroine. But even after that determination has been made, that she is no good, one cannot help but think she's been mistook as a villain. That is the ironic beauty of this story--the multiple shades of ambiguity, with no easy answers.Both the novel and 20th Century Fox's faithful version (adapted by Nunnally Johnson) do not provide a traditional resolution. This works because Rachel, like the unseen Rebecca of DuMaurier's earlier novel, hovers beyond the framework of the story. There's no way we can know every innocent or evil detail of her life. We also cannot know every detail of her beloved Phillip's life.Phillip, played by Richard Burton in his first major Hollywood film assignment, is strangely just as mysterious and ambiguous as Rachel. In a great scene, Phillip deliriously hangs between life and death and has a fantastic vision of marrying Rachel. He recovers, only to learn that it was all an illusion. His entire relationship with Rachel may all be an illusion.

My cousin Rachel is a black and white adaptation from the novel by Daphne du Maurier of the same title. Olivia de Havilland and Richard Burton star in this excellent film from 1952."Death is the price for murder": The film begins with these words, as to warn us about the story that the movie tells.When Philip's wealthy cousin, Ambrose, dies under mysterious circumstances from a sudden illness, he suspects Rachel (Ambrose's wife). He thinks his cousin has been murdered and he seeks vengeance. But when he meets her, he falls for her charms and he's no longer sure of what to think.What I've liked the most about this film is the suspense: lies within lies so we can't uncover the truth until the main character does. Burton and de Havilland give great performances. The story is very well told.

Headstrong Philip Ashley, an orphan raised by his uncle following the death of his parents, suspects foul play when his guardian dies abroad after smuggling out letters accusing his new wife (Olivia De Havilland) of trying to kill him. However, when she visits England he finds himself drawn to her despite himself and convinces himself that his uncle died as the result of a brain tumour that made him irrationally suspicious of those he loved. Despite this, evidence to suggest she might indeed be guilty leaves him with fresh doubts.Nunnally Johnson's adaptation of Daphne Du Maurier's murder mystery does a fine job of continuously wrong-footing the viewer so that we, like Philip, can never quite decide whether the outwardly elegant and refined widow Ashley is actually a cold-blooded killer. This uncertainty compels us to keep watching as the plot's twists manipulates us into believing first one thing then the other, making for a compelling and enjoyable mystery. Unfortunately, the deliberately ambiguous ending means we are still none the wiser as to whether 'shedunnit' or not when the final credits roll.27-year-old Richard Burton cuts an imposing, Heathcliff-like figure as Philip, the brash, impulsive heir to his uncle's fortune. He was always more effective as stern, authoritarian figures, and although he gives an impressive performance that largely carries the film, at times he struggles to inject the required touch of sensitivity in its more tender moments. It has to be said that events on screen are depicted with as much ambiguity as the mystery itself, with the viewer left to surmise that Philip and the widow have indeed engaged in a sexual liaison when the film coyly moves on to the next scene. Such subtlety, to varying degrees, is also evident in the clues regarding Rachel's possible guilt (or innocence) that are provided.It's a shame that Du Maurier failed to come up with a definitive conclusion to what, until its finale, is a truly absorbing drama, but in retrospect it's apparent that to have done so would have probably required too many additional twists and revelations to make anything she came up with plausible.