Psycho - 1960

There are those who will argue that Psycho is Hitchcock's best film. I am not one of them. Psycho is a brilliant excursion into fear that pushes many of our primal buttons, but it lacks the story and character complexity of Vertigo and Rear Window. Yet none of Hitchcock's films had as profound an impact upon the American psyche as this one. When it was initially released in 1960, it was a huge box office hit (there are stories of 3-mile long lines at drive-in entrances), and its popularity has not waned over the last four decades. In fact, the fascination with the film has grown to the point where 1998 will see the unthinkable: a remake.

Actually, going by the description of Norman Bates in Robert Bloch's novel Psycho, upon which screenwriter Joseph Stafano based his script, there was no way Perkins could have been considered for the part. Bloch's vision of Norman is a fat, balding, middle-aged voyeur. To make the character more sympathetic, Stefano completely reworked him, and Hitchcock was able to use Perkins. The result is one of the cinema's most chilling and memorable performances. Perkins became so identified with Norman Bates that it altered the trajectory of his career. For years after Psycho, he shunned talking about the part until, in the '70s, he finally made peace with Norman, and eventually returned to play the role in three Psycho sequels.

With Psycho, Hitchcock dabbled in cinematic taboos, pushing the censorship envelope. For example, this was the first American motion picture to feature a toilet being flushed (most movies of the era didn't even acknowledge the existence of toilets). Also, Janet Leigh is shown in her underwear on more than one occasion, and, during the famous shower scene, it's possible to see hints of flesh (most of which belong to a body double). The script also features a man speaking the word "transvestite" - a line that survived in the film only after a Herculean struggle on Stefano's part.

The film starts out in traditional fashion for a Hitchcock thriller. A woman, Marion Crane (Janet Leigh), desperate to find a way to be with her lover, Sam Loomis (John Gavin), embezzles money from her boss, then goes on the lam. She's not an apt criminal, however, and she leaves a wide trail. A used car salesman assesses her nervous mood and uses it to bilk her out of some extra cash. A somewhat-ominous policeman shadows her, almost to the point of stalking. If anyone could ever be said to look and act guilty, it's Marion. Eventually, she ends up at the out-of-the-way Bates Motel, where the shy-but-kind manager, Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins), offers her a room, a meal, and a sympathetic ear. During her conversation with Norman, when he speaks about the traps that life places everyone in, Marion resolves to return on the following morning and give back the money. Events of the night, which involve violence and the jealous rage of Norman's twisted mother, put an end to Marion's plans. Soon after, others arrive at the Bates Motel looking for her, including Loomis, a private investigator named Arbogast (Martin Balsam), and Marion's sister, Lila (Vera Miles). They all make horrifying discoveries.

Story-wise, Psycho is not extraordinary; its true ingeniousness lies in its construction. Hitchcock and Stafano have developed the movie in such a way that it consistently flouts expectations. There are two major surprises: the shower scene murder and the final revelation about Mother. A viewer who sees the film for the first time without knowing about either will experience the full impact of what Hitchcock intended. The greatest shock for the uninitiated is the early exit of Janet Leigh. This is doubly unexpected because, to this point, the screenplay had tricked us into accepting Marion as the main character. When events dispel that illusion, and the point-of-view shifts to Norman Bates', viewers are understandably nonplused. In order to keep this crucial aspect of the film secret and intact when Psycho opened in 1960, there were no advance screenings and no one was admitted to a showing after the feature had started.

Whenever anyone speaks about Psycho, the first images that come to mind are those of Janet Leigh being hacked to death in the shower. The scene is so famous that even people who have not seen the movie are aware of it. Bernard Herrmann's strident, discordant music has been used in countless other movies to denote the appearance of a "psycho." The brilliance of the scene lies in the editing. Those who go frame-by-frame through it will note how much is left to the imagination. We see a knife, blood (actually chocolate syrup), water, and a woman's naked body (with certain parts strategically concealed from the camera), but only briefly is the penetration of the blade into the flesh shown*. The full horror of the murder is only hinted at on-screen. It takes the power of the viewer's imagination to fill in the blanks. (Presumably, that's the reason why so many of today's unimaginative movie-goers, who are accustomed to having a screenful of gore presented for their consumption, find Psycho tame.) It's not surprising that the movie generated a wave of shower phobia - some people, made aware of their vulnerability during a shower, started taking baths. (Janet Leigh is one such victim -- she claims that she never took a shower again after making the film.)

Today, Psycho still holds up extraordinarily well (another reason why a remake seems pointless). With the exception of Halloween, no latter-day horror/thriller has been capable of generating as many goosebumps. The black-and-white photography is perfect for the film's tone and mood - the starkness of color would have blurred the nightmarish quality.

The painstaking care with which Hitchcock composed every scene is evident in the quality of the final product. Psycho may not represent the master director's pinnacle, but it is the motion picture for which he is best known, and its legacy is inarguably one of the most far reaching of any film to come out of a Hollywood studio.

Cast:

Anthony Perkins - Norman Bates
Vera Miles - Lila Crane
John Gavin - Sam Loomis
Janet Leigh - Marion Crane
Martin Balsam - Det. Milton Arbogast
John McIntire - Sheriff Al Chambers
Simon Oakland - Dr. Fred Richman
Frank Albertson - Tom Cassidy
Patricia Hitchcock - Caroline
Vaughn Taylor - George Lowery
Lurene Tuttle - Mrs. Chambers
John Anderson - California Charlie
Mort Mills - Highway Patrol Officer