Psycho

Psycho has lasted the test of time and is still considered to this day as one of the best films by famed director, Alfred Hitchcock, as well as one of the greatest films ever made in general. With its infamous story, characters, visuals, score and especially kills, Psycho retains its cryptic atmosphere and chilling suspense several decades later and manages to hold up surprisingly well with its themes and presentation. Being a secretary to a real-estate business, Marion Crane (played by Janet Leigh) decides to steal a large sum of money from a client and run away, so that she can marry her boyfriend, Sam (played by John Gavin). After an extended escape from a police officer, Marion finds herself at a secluded motel, the Bates Motel to be exact. The owner, Norman Bates (played by Anthony Perkins) gives her a room for the night, but (without going into obvious spoilers), an incident prevents her from leaving the following night. Realizing that she has disappeared and could be connected to a crime, Marion’s sister, Lila (played by Vera Miles) teams up with Sam to find out what happened to Marion at the Bates Motel and uncover the mysteries behind Norman and his incredibly cold domineering mother.  Based off the 1959 novel of the same name written by Robert Bloch, Psycho blossomed into a successful franchise after 1980 with several sequels, a (lazy) remake, and a prequel series: Bates Motel, starring Freddie Highmore and Vera Farmiga. Upon release, Psycho was an outstanding success at the box office and immediately won audiences over, but strangely the film was met with mixed reception from critics. Considering how this film is perceived nowadays, it’s strange to think that during its original debut, it wasn’t fully realized as the gem it was until much later.

One of the smarter decision by Hitchcock and screenplay writer for the film, Joseph Stefano, was reshaping the original story and picking and choosing what to keep similar and what to change from the original book. While the original novel has the same narrative, characters and tone as the film, a lot of the books elements wouldn’t have translated very well into the screen; in terms of keeping the correct pace, removing character aspects that would have made them less three dimensional and more one-note, and avoiding any of the explicit sexual and/or graphic violence that happens in the book. It made a lot of smart choices in not only condensing the story into a stronger three-act structure with less padding and awkward moments, but also in making the character less unlikeable and the final twist more surprising. The film’s narrative is one that is honestly pretty straightforward and doesn’t do too much in the way of working as a murder mystery (a. because everybody already knows who did it (kind of), and b. it doesn’t really lay out clues for the twist), but what saves it is that the actual progression is very well paced, the beats themselves are engaging and keep the movie flowing forward, and while not mapping out clues to what is actually going on, it does provide a great sense of anticipation for how and why these actions were undertaken and how they are going to be resolve. Its nicely split between two sections that feel very well laid out: with the second act not losing its footing after a dramatic conclusion to its first act, which really wasn’t done that much at the time (if at all). If there’s any complaints to be had about the narrative, it would be the final moments of the film with the psychiatrist mapping out the whole twist of the movie as opposed to allowing the audience to figure most of it out themselves. This most likely comes from the film’s book origins which would need to rely on a lot of dialogue to get its point across, but while the rest of the movie translates very well from book to film, that last section didn’t do it as smoothly as the rest.

With how the characters are handled in the film, they are made to be far more sympathetic and less grotesque than how they were portrayed in the books. The book’s portrayal of a lot of these characters is a bit more mean-spirited with almost all of them having some disgusting quality about them, but through better handling of character and a great cast, they make it a lot more interesting to watch, especially when it comes to the heroine and the antagonist. Janet Leigh gives a great portrayal as Marion; carrying this more confidant edge that makes her feel less like a push-over, but still giving across that feminine touch that makes her come across as sympathetic, which makes the role more engaging as she neither feels pure evil or pure good. Anthony Perkins is fantastic as Norman Bates and really helps give him a defined role; while the books version is far more unlikeable; being portrayed as unkempt, overweight, perverted and a little too obvious with his crimes, Perkins’ portrayal feels a lot more unassuming and soft-spoken; his reservation and quiet personality makes his brief moments of becoming unhinged and flustered a lot more terrifying because of it. On the flip side, you can feel the movie kind of stumbling a bit once the new characters are brought in the essentially wrap up the story, as both Lila and Sam aren’t the most interesting or even fleshed out characters and only feel like they exist just as a means of wrapping up the film. They aren’t bad by any means, and the acting is fine enough to make their scenes effective, but it doesn’t contain that sense of morally grey edge that the previous leads had.

The film has very infamous shots, music cues and angle decisions, but its funny to realize that a lot of these elements weren’t really for a stylistic choice, but rather due to budgetary constraints. After two unsuccessful projects and with a source material that a lot of people were against being adapted, Paramount Pictures refused to provide the usual fund for the film, leaving Hitchcock to make and film the movie himself with his television series crew (also known as Alfred Hitchcock Presents). This is why the film is done in black-and-white during a time when it wasn’t needed, why the music is restricted to solely being string-based as opposed to featuring a giant orchestral score, and why the movie doesn’t have many establishing shots, instead relying on a lot of close-ups and straightforward shots. This was actually perfect and helped the film out largely. The black-and-white gives the films that old-fashion almost crime-noir type of atmosphere to the film; helped out by the pacing and even in some circumstances, the narrative itself. The movie’s tension is highlighted a lot stronger thanks to this choice; allowing for angles and shots that extenuate some of the film’s great lighting and shadow-work. The shots by cinematographer John L. Russell can be pretty basic in nature, but the closeness of them makes a lot of the moments that much tenser because of it (especially during a specific shower scene). The score and theme of the film written by Bernard Herrmann has gone down in history as one of the most effective and striking themes in all of cinema, and its blatantly obvious that it is a true fact. The ear-piercing violin strings whether a kill occurs operating as a harsh jolt against the usually smoother, yet still harshly on-edge remainder of the piece, makes for a theme that works both in stressful moments as well as the panicked moments, it’s a great piece of music.

Psycho can remain in the history books as a film that will be remembered for years and years, and thankfully, can be watched all those years later, and still get a similar reaction to when it was originally released. It seems like a majority of the film’s dismay and lack of critical approval came from it being a departure from Hitchcock’s usual work as well as the narrative’s risque and (at the time) heavily shocking material, but considering that this was a time period when the most shocking and one of the most censored thing about the movie was the fact that it showed a flushing toilet, it’s probably something to take with a grain of salt. The movie has fantastic suspense and tension, a thrilling and iconic soundtrack, great acting, wonderful visuals, and a timelessness that comes from a story that could have been easily dated if it wasn’t ramified to work with the film Relive this thriller classic and see how the term ‘’mama’s boy’’ can go a bit too far.