31 Days of Halloween Films #2: Psycho
The Lowdown: Some chick steals some dough from her work, tries to get away with it, and meets a creepy motel owner who likes to fix people sandwiches in his dead animal room. Surprises ensue.
The Breakdown (Spoilers): Classic, atmospheric, creepy and unique are all great ways to define Psycho, arguably Alfred Hitchcock’s most popular film. For the time it was made it was innovative, fresh and terrifying, and I’m very happy to say it still holds up today. From the early “viral” marketing for the film to the misdirection in the casting, Psycho separates itself from the pack by retaining originality in the genre, showing us things that had never been seen in a movie before, and defying the expectations of thriller fans everywhere.
From a technical perspective, you would be hard pressed to find a misstep throughout the runtime. The shower sequence is the stuff of cinema legend but the whole film has a level of polish and quality that was rare for the time it was made. Anthony Perkins is, quite simply, magnetic as Norman Bates. Essentially Perkins runs a clinic on the creepy boy next door role, infusing Bates with charm, wit and uneasiness from the moment he is introduced. He plays the type of character that makes you feel something is…off about him, but you can not quite place what it is. From his taxidermic hobby to his clear connection to his mother, Norman Bates comes off as a very sick individual, and one that has endured all the way to today, some fifty-years on.
The cinematography is, to put it lightly, awe-inspiring. From simple close-ups of a peeping tom to a brilliantly shot chase sequence involving a police officer, every frame looks good. Hitchcock, with the help of cinematographer John Russell, does an excellent job at keeping the audience, and the camera, at arms length for most of the film, never revealing the true nature of Norman’s mother until the end of the film, and it works magnificently. The shot of Martin Balsam climbing the stairs of the Bates mansion with the camera positioned overhead is chilling because of how cold the shot is. You literally see a man walking up the stairs with plenty of light everywhere, when from the left of the frame a door opens and the killer emerges, knife in hand, ready to pounce. It may strike some as a lazy shot but I find it to be brutally horrifying and a real standout in a film full of great shots.
Movie scores do not get much better than the one in Psycho. While it has been parodied and imitated endlessly since the film was released, the high strings and melody of the music still makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up. While I have heard it called distracting, Psycho’s score is a brilliantly irritating piece of music that immediately stresses you out and ramps up the tension in a given scene. While the editing is often the main focus of the shower sequence I could not imagine watching that scene without those piercing strings. It does all the right things in terms of creating a very specific and difficult mental state in the mind of the viewer and plays with you on a subconscious level that adds to the films’ terror.
The Comedown: There is a certain collection of films that defy criticism. Psycho is one of those. From its foothold on the “crazy-son-with-mommy-issues” genre to the innovation in every aspect of filmmaking, Psycho is a titan of the genre and one that gets plenty of respect from new generations all the time. While this rarely gets on peoples’ must-see Halloween films, I had to give it its due, mainly out of respect.