Psycho

Psycho, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, is regarded as one of the most influential films in cinema history, especially in the horror genre. The film, which broke box office records, has a simple storyline, a small cast, a few unite effects and just a few locations. According to the story, Marion Crane steals 40,000 dollars from her boss to spend with her boyfriend and ends up in an isolated hotel. She meets Norman Bates, the proprietor, who welcomes her with a warm greeting. The young woman is brutally murdered without warning later in the film, turning it into a mystery. Following events, it appears that Norman has been concealing one of the most bizarre secrets. Since its release in 1960, the movie has had a significant influence on film-making and audiences. With the score from Bernard Herrmann, Psycho changed the way movies worked by owning up to the notion that rather than being a dream to be inhabited, movies are a game to be played. In this essay, there is a demonstration that Psycho marked an important turning point in the film industry.

Tactical Changes in Video Production

Firstly, Psycho spearheaded one of the most decisive changes in censorship. At the time of its production, censorship rules referred to as Motion Picture Production Code or Hays code were in place. The classical film models discouraged such stomach-churning scenes of cinema, but Psycho pioneered going against the laws that demonized scenes of toilet flushing and oozing of human blood in horror movies. The movies of the time comprised of elements such as the escalating nuclear tensions among superpowers with censorship depicting portrayal of talents, king-sized beds, and toilets as a taboo. With the bathroom as the centerpiece, Hitchcock challenged the taboos and pushed past the rules of the code, especially in the manner of depicting sex. For example, by beginning with a post-coital scene, the film sought to mock the Hays Code. The producer, Alfred Hitchcock, seems to be against dancing to the censor’s whims. He had a determination to take on the censorship both domestically and internationally with the help of charm and evasion.

Psycho shattered the 1960s film conformity to customs. Ideally, the previous periods were dark and stifling because of upholding the traditions about filmmaking. Despite that it was produced five decades ago, Psycho continues to motivate and inspire current filmmakers and television producers. With the help of trickery, Hitchcock teased the press but kept the tradition-shredding narrative twists a secret. The earliest example of the graphic violence film also spawned the flick of the slasher. Most horror films of that time lacked the impressive standards of the current horror film genre. However, the work of Hitchcock stood apart by enduring traditional film aspects. Psycho caused a sensation in the 1960s and the feeling exists to the present. For example, the temperature of filmmaking changed after Psycho because fewer people began attending cinema with a belief of an increase in violence. Marion Crane’s clutching of a shower curtain and her body sliding down the white tile, cutting the curtain from its hooks and the lazy swirl of blood washing away. The hardly a minute incident in the shower contains several pieces of the film. Today, the strobe-like editing standards are perceived as ordinary or leisurely, but they were unheard of and significantly opposed to in the 1960s when the film was made. By having the biggest star get murdered after forty minutes, Hitchcock presented Psycho as a dare to the audience and this even led people becoming afraid of showers and motel rooms.

The use of the music score is also a significant aspect of the horror movie that Alfred Hitchcock introduced to the horror film industry in Psycho. The film is centered around a woman being hacked with a kitchen knife in a cheap and lonely hotel on the roadside. The chilling, screaming, and the kitchen knife are skillfully edited to suit the scenes. The screeching violin soundtrack have been borrowed, referenced, copied, and purloined by an astounding number of movies of a similar genre which reveals that Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho paved the way for the creation of modern horror movies as well as the entire popular culture. The stabbing and violin shrieking occur alongside the murders. The sounds of the blade piercing through the flesh create a disturbing effect in the minds of the viewers. Hitchcock’s film approach began incorporating symbolism and reflecting on the events of the modern world, especially the flushing of feelings and passions down the drain. With Hitchcock’s new model, the elements of films that were initially perceived as impurities in his approach of cut and chase turned out to be a vital flavor in the modern films.

Psycho also pioneered quick-cutting to ensure delivery of the message in the movies while evading the traditional movie production constraints in a skillful way. For example, the shower scene fails to reveal the action of piercing human flesh with a blade, but allows the viewers to create the image in their minds. The knife does not even touch the flesh of the woman. Hitchcock utilizes quick edits to reveal that the knife makes 90 cuts in 45 seconds. The illusion that Hitchcock presents skillfully is a form of graphic violence that is utilized in the modern film industry. After its production, the censors could not understand what allegations to make from the shower scene where the curtain was ripped open and Marion Crane was stabbed with a knife because nudity and cutting human flesh with a knife were significantly hidden. Hitchcock convinced the censors that such assertions were mere perceptions rather than what took place in the film.

The movie opens with a blond woman in bra and panties in a cheap hotel enjoying her afternoon. Previously, there was no film that had portrayed a picture of a female character in her underwear. The sequence of the shower incident pictured the taboos around sex and violence in Hollywood. The prominent critics of the film asserted that Psycho jolted Americans out of their post-war innocence by portraying the 1960s as the period of social upheaval. According to them, Psycho presents the secret of the American way of life that is associated with concealing social ills as an ordinary thing. The nature of sexist attitudes presented in Psycho reflected the unthinkable casual violence of all times.

Humans as the Aliens

Hitchcock presents an idea that monsters are not the aliens that come from space to attack humans but the humans themselves. The previous movies contained an element of killers on the move, rampaging maniacs, or a combination of the two. Psycho reshaped what was indeed terrifying in such films. Norman, the manager of Bates Motel, looks shy, innocent, and superficially-childlike. He also acts nicely to his victim-to-be. It is difficult for the audience to suspect him of being the potential murderer. Norman’s psychopathic nature is discovered when Marion’s sister and boyfriend begin searching for her. Hitchcock reveals how the psychotic Norman has two different personalities: himself and his deceased mother. The portrayal conflicts with the image that Norman depicts in his first encounter with Marion. It is not the violence that Norman depicts, but his character that is the scariest part of the film. Despite Norman acting harmlessly on the outside, Hitchcock portrays him as a person that is highly disturbed from within. When he talks to Marion, he appears likable. It is difficult to believe that he is capable of acting so violently. The audience trusts the monster from the beginning. Bigfoot and Godzilla that were the primary aliens in the previous horror movies lost significance in the horror genre with Hitchcock’s presentation (Hein). Monsters like Norman Bates exist in the society, but some people hardly accept this. The presentation of humans as aliens to other humans has become one of the most significant elements of horror.

Psychosexual Context of the Film

Both Norman and Marion are sexualized objects in Psycho. Hitchcock reveals how Marion’s love affair with Sam, which was illicit in the 1950s, resulted in aberrant behavior and sealed her fate. Specifically, Marion had stolen the money to be with her financially-strapped boyfriend. Her ultimate price for theft is associated with complicated symbols and subtexts. This was intended to prepare the audience to be comfortable with the causes of horror prior to pulling the rug of expectation out from under them. Ideally, Psycho captures feminine anxiety and tormented sexual confusion in black and white (Greven 114). Marion having an affair and engaging in a socially unacceptable code of conduct such as stealing from her employer as a result of romance was perceived as very deviant behavior. Norman’s sexual life seems repressed. It is from Marion’s sexual conduct that Norman’s position of psychotic sexual behavior is revealed. For instance, Marion’s naked body arouses Norman leading to the shower violence that is the epitome of evil in the movie. Apparently, the shower violence is a form of an annihilation of a body of a woman because it indicates that the narrative of the female sexuality is not conceived from outside threats but from inside.

The general analysis of Norman reveals a self-loathing and misogynistic man that is submissive to his mother while the scene of the parlor reflects on his deranged mind. More specifically, Psycho encapsulates the struggle between his misogynic beliefs towards women and his latent sexual desires for his mother, thereby uncovering the sexist attitudes towards women and sexual deviance that is hidden within the language of Norman. Referring to a woman as a doll implies that women are relegated to play things. Being obsessed with birds, Baker suggests that Norman perceives women as animals. Love for stuffing birds because they are passive is an indicator that Norman likes to dominate women with an assumption that they play an inactive role opposed to men. Soman asserts that even the surname of Marion, “Crane,” reinforces the notion of assuming the submissive role as well. Therefore, the work of Hitchcock presents repressed gender stereotypes.

In conclusion, Psycho presented a significant change in the film industry, especially in the horror genre. The film spearheaded tactical video production such as symbolism, cutting, and rhythmical music. With such tactics, the producers can easily portray nude bodies and spilling of human blood on the screen without creating a conflict with customs. The tactics enabled Alfred Hitchcock to address popular culture issues such as extreme sexual violence against women. More so, it revealed that humans are the primary aliens of the people and not aliens from space as portrayed by the conventional horror movies of that time.

Works Cited

Greven, David. Psycho-Sexual: Male Desire in Hitchcock, De Palma, Scorsese, and Friedkin. Austin: University of Texas, 2013.

Hein, Mathew. “The Monster among Us in Psycho.” Philosophy and Film, 20 April 2013, philfilmrhodes.blogspot.co.ke/2013/04/the-monster-among-us-in-psycho.html. Accessed 25 July 2017.

Soman, Shaun. “The Parlor Scene: Exploring Gender and Sexuality in Psycho”. The Stone. www.washleestone.com/the-parlor-scene-exploring-gender-and-sexuality-in-psycho/. Accessed 25 July 2017.