Psycho 1998 psycho taxidermy
Perkins does an uncanny job of establishing the complex character of Norman, in a performance that has become a landmark.
Psycho 1998 psycho taxidermy movie#
This remains the most effective slashing in movie history, suggesting that situation and artistry are more important than graphic details. The closing shots are not graphic but symbolic, as blood and water spin down the drain, and the camera cuts to a closeup, the same size, of Marion's unmoving eyeball. The slashing chords of Bernard Herrmann's soundtrack substitute for more grisly sound effects. Hitchcock shot in black and white because he felt the audience could not stand so much blood in color (the 1998 Gus Van Sant remake specifically repudiates that theory).
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Unlike modern horror films, "Psycho" never shows the knife striking flesh. Seeing the shower scene today, several things stand out. Truffaut observed that the film's opening, with Marion in a bra and panties, underlines the later voyeurism. When Norman spies on Marion, Hitchcock said, most audience members read it as Peeping Tom behavior. So touched, he feels threatened by his feelings. She is also moved to rethink her own actions. Marion has overheard the voice of Norman's mother speaking sharply with him, and she gently suggests that Norman need not stay here in this dead end, a failing motel on a road that has been bypassed by the new interstate. He does that during their long conversation in Norman's "parlor," where savage stuffed birds seem poised to swoop down and capture them as prey. And here again Hitchcock's care with the scenes and dialog persuades us that Norman and Marion will be players for the rest of the film.
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She pulls into the Bates Motel, and begins her short, fateful association with Norman Bates. Every first-time viewer believes this setup establishes a story line the movie will follow to the end.įrightened, tired, perhaps already regretting her theft, Marion drives closer to Fairvale but is slowed by a violent rainstorm. She trades in her car for one with different plates, but at the dealership she's startled to see the same patrolman parked across the street, leaning against his squad car, arms folded, staring at her. A highway patrolman (Mort Mills) wakes her from a roadside nap, questions her, and can almost see the envelope with the stolen money. And as Marion flees Phoenix on her way to Sam's home town of Fairvale, Calif., we get another favorite Hitchcock trademark, paranoia about the police. It never for a moment feels like material manufactured to mislead us.
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This is a completely adequate setup for a two-hour Hitchcock plot. So Marion's motive is love, and her victim is a creep. When the money appears, it's attached to a slimy real estate customer (Frank Albertson) who insinuates that for money like that, Marion might be for sale. He cannot marry her because of his alimony payments they must meet in secret. We see her first during an afternoon in a shabby hotel room with her divorced lover, Sam Loomis ( John Gavin). Marion Crane does steal $40,000, but still she fits the Hitchcock mold of an innocent to crime. The setup involves a theme that Hitchcock used again and again: The guilt of the ordinary person trapped in a criminal situation.
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Psycho 1998 psycho taxidermy full#
Both of these elements work because Hitchcock devotes his full attention and skill to treating them as if they will be developed for the entire picture. That's largely because of Hitchcock's artistry in two areas that are not as obvious: The setup of the Marion Crane story, and the relationship between Marion and Norman ( Anthony Perkins). These surprises are now widely known, and yet "Psycho" continues to work as a frightening, insinuating thriller. "It is required that you see 'Psycho' from the very beginning!" Hitchcock decreed, explaining, "the late-comers would have been waiting to see Janet Leigh after she had disappeared from the screen action." "Psycho" was promoted like a William Castle exploitation thriller. "Do not reveal the surprises!" the ads shouted, and no moviegoer could have anticipated the surprises Hitchcock had in store-the murder of Marion ( Janet Leigh), the apparent heroine, only a third of the way into the film, and the secret of Norman's mother. "You might say I was playing them, like an organ." It was the most shocking film its original audience members had ever seen. "I was directing the viewers," the director told Truffaut in their book-length interview. Yet no other Hitchcock film had a greater impact.