Somebody wrote that the book is different. Well, I haven't read the book but I've seen the film. And, it's absurd, the whole thing it doesn't make any sense. Yes, Alec Guinness was a very special actor, he acted in many other great movies but, here, he is trapped in a nonsense. Having a too small role, the great Bette Davis doesn't show too much.

Producer: Michael Balcon. Executive producers: Daphne Du Maurier, Alec Guinness. Copyright August 1959 by Du Maurier-Guinness Productions. Released through Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. New York opening at the Guild: 6 August 1959. U.S. release: August 1959. U.K. trade premiere: August 1959. Australian release: 22 October 1959. Sydney opening at the Liberty. 92 minutes. NOTES: Location scenes filmed in the Loire Valley, France. COMMENT: Newsweek headed their review of the book with the caption, "Take Me Back to Manderlay". Indeed, there are so many echoes of Rebecca in the film, it often seems the sprawling chateau and its atmospheric surrounds is the real star of the movie rather than Mr Guinness, or rather two of Mr Guinness who revels in the cleverly crafted split screen special effects. Mind you, that is all to the good, for neither Guinness is terribly convincing. Not all his fault, either. The book takes great pains to point out that the Barrett character can speak French like a native. And what does Mr Guinness speak? English! Not a word of French, would you believe, in either of his incarnations. The same goes for the rest of the cast. British accents all around. In fact the only person who has a foreign accent is the lovely Nicole Maurey. Still, that is a convention I guess we have to put up with. But even suspending our disbelief, the film still presents insoluble problems. The plot seems not only confused and confusing, but takes an interminable time to get under way. It is Miss Maurey, of course, who makes the picture worth watching. Despite her star billing, Miss Davis has only two or three scenes. It is is young Annabel Bartlett who enjoys the principal female role, though Irene Worth (as the wife) and Pamela Brown (as the sister) are allowed to share in the histrionics. The Scapegoat is one of those rare movies that actually play better (at least in a wide-screen format) on television where the viewer can relax in comfort and doesn't really care how long the plot takes to make itself clear, or how talkative and slow-moving it all is. True, attractively atmospheric scenery and a fair dollop of production values help too.

The premise is contrived to begin with: a British professor vacationing in Paris happens to meet a French count who looks and sounds just like him. They converse in a bar, and the professor admits having a dull and empty life while the count has had a very full life. The count tricks the professor into staying at a hotel room, and in the morning, the count disappears, leaving the professor to be mistaken for the count. The professor tries to convince the count's family and associates that he is not really the count, but nobody believes him, and he is forced to play the count's role, dealing with his family, the glass foundry the count owns, and the count's friends and mistresses. The professor's behavior and attitudes differ than that of the real count, but only one of the mistresses puts two and two together.Akin to Monty Python, the movie is played straight, and the performers all play their parts well. The movie would undoubtedly have come crashing down if it weren't for that. The movie is in fact based on a novel by Daphne DuMarier, whose plot is quite more complicated.

. . . as a lack of affect infects BOTH of his indistinguishable characterizations in THE SCAPEGOAT. "John" is plagued by boredom, and "The Count" suffers from ennui, which hardly makes for a riveting picture. Apparently "Bela" (the Count's mistress) can tell them apart because one of these johns is cut, but Bela's off-screen discovery does nothing to help viewers distinguish between two of the most phlegmatic personages ever expected to carry a plot. At least REBECCA kept us guessing until the end as to whether it was Col. Mustard in the boathouse with a sea anchor or Elvira Gulch in the attic with her candlestick. But since MGM's trailer for the Picturization of Daphne the Muddier's later pin-the-tail-on-the-scapegoat novel contends that this yarn "is Twice as Exciting on the screen" as it is in the book, viewers are likely to rush out of Revival Theater Showings eager to ditch any unread Book-of-the-Month Club copies of THE SCAPEGOAT in their nearest Goodwill Recycling Bin.