I wasn't allowed to see Psycho when it first came out in 1960. My parents only allowed us to see Walt Disney and John Wayne movies automatically and only a handful of other approved films. Psycho didn't make the list. Perhaps a good thing.

Finally seeing Psycho my freshman year of college, I was unable to take a shower in a motel room for seven years. Even now I make sure that every door is locked securely before I can "risk"; taking a motel shower. Hitchcock's film has that much power.

Assuming that you are already aware of the classic shower scene since it has reappeared in Psycho II, reprised in the unfortunate Van Sant Psycho remake/desecration, been spoofed in High Anxiety, and influenced countless subsequent horror movies, remarks here should not spoil the film for you. You can make a credible case that this landmark movie gave birth to the modern horror film. By chance if you are the last carbon life form to know about the pivotal scene, read no further because the big "surprise" will be revealed in the next sentence.


Never before had a protagonist been killed off before half the movie was over with no hope of return. There would be no flashbacks, no alternative points of view, and no dream sequence. Hitchcock invites us to a nightmare, a horrific rollercoaster ride that has the audience holding its breath the rest of the way. Hitchcock had manipulates the audience perfectly, and film has never been the same since.

Psycho is the first film that involved me so much that I became completely hooked on the magic of movies. I have seen this film over 40 times, and it continues to hold my interest.


A Little Background

The last of Hitchcock's Paramount pictures, which was actually shot on the back lots of Universal Studios, Psycho was deliberately kept on a low budget. Since other films had been making a great deal of money with cheap movies, the legendary director took it as a challenge to make this film for under $1 million. He even forsook his regular feature film crew that had just completed North by Northwest, using the television crew that filmed Alfred Hitchcock Presents.

Shooting in black and white helped keep the film within the targeted budget, but the main reason that Hitchcock wanted to shoot Psycho in black and white was that he felt it would be too gory in Technicolor. Van Sant's color footage in his poorly crafted 1998 remake prove that Hitchcock's use of chocolate syrup in the tub is far more effective. The master illusionist knows how to get inside our minds with visual imagery.

Based loosely on Robert Bloch's novel of the same name that was about a Wisconsin man who killed a number of his neighbors, Hitchcock obtained the rights to the novel after reading the book on a plane flight to England. When young screenwriter Joseph Stephano came up with the idea of focusing on Marion the first part of the film and killing her off in the shower, Hitchcock's creative genius was sparked--he decided to cast a major actress for that part. All the more shocking for the audience that way!

The chosen actress is Janet Leigh, who had appeared in numerous films, including Orson Welles' classic Touch of Evil. Leigh will now be indelibly linked with Marion Crane. While Hitchcock treated her with great respect, presenting her with Bloch's original novel before the screenplay was finished, Leigh says that she would have taken the part just for the opportunity to work with Hitchcock. This is the only Hitchcock film that she ever appears in.

With the one well-known actress getting murdered early, the audience is sent reeling unexpectedly into horror's abyss, as they must then seek a relatively unknown character to follow. Just who is the protagonist?

One of the sympathetic candidates for the audience is the Norman Bates character, played to perfection by Anthony Perkins, whose best known leading role previously had been as baseball player Jimmy Piersall in Fear Strikes Out. Perkins tightropes his way through the Norman Bates persona so unforgettably that he will forever be associated with the role.

Other protagonists include: Detective Arbogast (New York character actor Martin Balsam), Sam Loomis (Universal contract player John Gavin), and Lila Crane (Vera Miles). Actually the real protagnist of Psycho and with most Hitchcock movies is the camera, and the director has never had as much fun with the audience as he does here.

While Leigh claims in The Making of Psycho that Hitchcock was very considerate of her, not all actor stories are so pleasant. The Master of Suspense is quoted as saying that the actual filming process was rather boring to him because he had already visualized how his movie would be before starting--making actors little more than pawns in his hands, especially if it was an actor that he didn't especially respect. Such was the case in Psycho with John Gavin. Hitchcock privately referred to him as "the stiff" and once conferred privately with Janet Leigh, asking her to do "something" to evoke passion from Gavin in the initial hotel bedroom scene.

What Makes Psycho Work So Well?

Psycho represents Hitchcock hitting on all cylinders in his first true "horror" movie. It still resembles his classic suspense films like North by Northwest, Vertigo, Rear Window, and where a main character goes through her daily activities when before being swept into a suspenseful vortex of intrigue. Similarly, the "villain" is virtually indistinguishable from the "good guys" in this thriller, and identities continue to be obscurred. Just WHO is that woman buried in the cemetery?

Acting

The acting, most notably with Anthony Perkins and Janet Leigh is outstanding. Perkins personifies Norman as a shy but charming young man who dutifully protects his sick old mother. He shows subtle inward signs of righteous anger when she is threatened by the Arbogast and Loomis characters, so he treads the fine line of engendering our sympathy and dreading the monster that he hides. For some of Leigh's best acting, just take a close look at her facial gestures as she is driving towards Fairview--we've all felt her uneasiness when police are following behind, and we sense her alternating feelings of guilt and smug triumph as she drives. The fact that this is done silently or done with a voice-over is remarkable.

Plot structure, screenwriting, and music

The whole plot concept is sheer genius. Begining in a cheap Phoenix hotel room during a stolen lunch break with some stolen time, Marion Crane and Sam Loomis want to get married but have no money. Back at work, she is seizes an easy opportunity to take off $40,000 to solve her financial problems, heading westward to join Sam, but stops at the Bates Motel.

Talking with the shy motel proprietor, she discovers that he lives in a private trap and that she has just created a similar one for herself. Resolving to return to Phoenix to extract herself from her crime, Marion takes a baptismal shower. At this point film history is made with Hitchcock's dizzy ride of terror.

Part of the genius of the script lies with foreshadowing references, most notably to the classic shower scene in the Bates Motel. Of course we begin with a hotel room shot after the camera pans over downtown Phoenix. During this initial conversation with Sam, Marion remarks "We pay, too, who meet in cheap hotel rooms." Later on the road when the police officer wakes Marion up from her nap, he suggests to her that there are plenty of motels in the area and that she should pull into one, "just to be safe." These all prepare us for a premature climax; at least for the first one.

Screenwriter Stephano also works subtle motifs into the plot to bring out certain themes. Of course Psycho refers to a person who lives in multiple worlds and has a split personality. Even the screen credits foreshadow this concept. Reenforcing the concept are multiple mirrors found throughout the story. Nearly every scene uses mirrors--the rear view in Marion's car, the overhead shot in the car dealer restroom, the desk at the Bates Motel, and a whole series of mirrors that scares Lila in Mrs. Bates' room.

Another element that Stephano and Hitchcock weave throughout Psycho is a "bird" motif. Marion herself is a "bird," as her last name is Crane. Of course, British slang at the time refers to women as "birds," fitting into the overall plot as well. Note the picture on the motel wall that falls to the floor when Norman discovers the shower room murder--a bird, naturally. Norman practices taxidermy and has a whole collection of birds. Thus, when he states that his mother "is as harmless as one of these stuffed birds," this has deeper layers of meaning. Embellishing this bird motif even further is Bernard Herman's brilliant all-strings musical score--his shower room music resembles shrieking birds. Note where these sounds re-occur for additional pleasure.

Director control, Editing and Cinematography

There is no question that this is a Hitchcock film. It has his marks all over it with familiar visual references. We have the required blonde lady protagonists and we have the necessary voyeuristic references, most obviously with the opening shot peeking into the hotel room and later behind Norman's painting of "The Rape of Lucretia." Hitchcock remains a favorite among foreign audiences with his emphasis on the visual, so notice how little dialogue that he requires here. There is a typical Hitchcockian rhythm to the film, as dialogue scenes are followed by long stretches of scenes that are purely visual.

With Hitchcock the camera is all-important. In fact, he instructs his actors to follow where his camera is going because he already knows what his film is going to do for it to work. He doesn't need actors who are going to interfere with his artistic vision. So many times in Psycho, we are let in on Marion's inner turmoil. Notice how the camera silently communicates this as she first debates taking the money back at her Phoenix home. Of course, it is no accident that Hitchcock has had Marion change into her black slip and bra as she contemplates the crime.

Hitch meticulously selects his camera angles, types of shots, and framing throughout the film. There are numerous examples to cite, but one of note is the overhead shot of Arbogast climbing the steps towards Mrs. Bates room and the subsequent tracking shot. There are multiple reasons for these shots, which will be apparent after viewing Psycho and thoroughly contemplating the scene.

Of course, there is the much studied shower scene to illustrate the illusionary effects of effective editing. Hitchcock spent a solid week filming this crucial 45-second sequence. It begins rather slowly with cuts between Marion's profile and shots of the showerhead, and then the fun begins with rapid cuts that will make you swear that our heroine has been slashed to shreds. Watch closely and you will be able to tell that the butcher knife never does actually touch Marion's body.

Never before has a murder like this been filmed so artistically. The rapid shower slashing accompanied with harsh violin strokes is terrifying even 40 years later. Watch the way Hitch's camera transitions from the circling blood in the drain to Marion's lifeless eye. Suddenly the shocked audience sits without anyone to latch onto for the protagonist, so the camera slowly pans through the motel room, first reminding us of the now inconsequential $40,000, and then up to the Bates house where we hear Norman yelling "O God, mother, blood!" Far gorier scenes have been filmed in recent history. None leaves longer lasting impressions.

The Denouement

Knowing about the shower scene beforehand doesn't cheapen the experience. Most of my high school students had only seen the Psycho sequels and knew only of that shower scene without the surrounding context, yet this venerable classic still works with a younger audience. A later scene always caused screams from many of the young ladies and provoked shocked expressions from many of the young men. Universally the students remarked about how Psycho was much better than the teen slashers that they had been watching.

I am surprised that even the weakest scene in the movie--the oft-cited psychologist's overly detailed explanation--works with younger audiences, left confused by the complexity of the characters. The original Psycho remains unsurpassed and still works with modern audiences if they will overcome any prejudice they have against black and white films. No need for a remake without Anthony Perkins in the pivotal role!

Hitchcock has tapped primal forces and fears here, fears that remain with us today. Which of us has ever contemplated whether we could get by with a crime, have done something that we felt guilty about, or felt uneasy when followed by a policeman. Hitch taps into our own guilt by making us a party to the murder--we voyeuristically peek in on the crime. We also only have to read a daily newspaper to hear about some random murder that can make us wonder if we could ever be a victim in such a horror scene.

Fortunately, most of us will never have to face that reality. We can take the ultimate two-hour rollercoaster ride by watching Hitchcock's shocking masterpiece. The thing about Psycho that is different from most movies, is that the scenes continue to live on inside our memory long after the images have disappeared from the screen. That's what great movies do--they continue to live within.

After all, we all go a little mad sometimes. Psycho allows us to experience the madness without fully jumping on board, and Hitchcock has introduced more people to abnormal psychology than anyone since Sigmund Freud.