DreamWorks’ developing remake of the classic 1940 Alfred Hitchcock film Rebecca now has a director.  Deadline reports that Nikolaj Arcel has been tapped to take the helm of the film, which has a script by Eastern Promises scribe Steven Knight.  Arcel most recently helmed the Danish film A Royal Affair, which was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar this year. Arcel is expected to do a quick rewrite on the script, but the report notes that his hiring already has young actresses eyeing the film.

The story of Rebecca enters on a young woman who marries a rich widower, only to find that her husband’s late wife still haunts their mansion estate.  The redo will apparently be closer to Daphne Du Maurier’s source novel than Hitchcock’s film, but remaking Hitch’s only Best Picture winner is still a tall order.