Yet another confession. (I seem to make these too frequently. I should watch more movies.) I’ve never seen Psycho - either Hitchcock’s or Van Sant’s.
Oh, I knew about it from popular culture - the shower scene, the Bates Motel, the soundtrack - but I had never seen the movie, so I didn’t know how it ended, or how any parts of it fit together. About a year ago, determined to remedy this situation, I went out to rent the movie. Neither the original nor the remake were available to rent, so in a fit of irritation, I searched online and read the script so I’d at the very least know the story.
Which, I suppose, is much like seeing wrapped presents beneath the Christmas tree, but looking at your parents receipt that they left out to find out what they bought you. The end result is the same, but the enjoyment isn’t there at all.
So I’ve ruined it for myself. I’m disappointed, but I can remedy this situation as well. Instead of simply watching Hitchcock’s Psycho, I’m going to watch Hitchcock and Van Sant’s remake back-to-back so I can be insightful and pretentious and then post here about the differences between the two, or how this movie typecast Anthony Perkins, or so on and so forth.
I have seen Psycho many times (the Hitchcock version), and I enjoy it every time. I don’t like the new version or the sequels. I remember it being the first “black and white” movie that I actually liked.
The soundtrack to this movie is awesome. It is partly the reason I listen to classical music. The soundtrack to this movie inspired the backing music to Eleanor Rigby by The Beatles.
I agree about the soundtrack. In the 70s (I don’t remember the publisher), a series of books that showed the movie scene by scene, with all the dialog, was printed. I bought a couple of those, one of them being Psycho. The thing that surprised me the most after reading the book and watching the movie was how little dialog there is in the movie and yet you can follow it easily and not noticing it, the music replacing the spoken word, transmitting the appropriate emotions.
Also, how many pop cultures references came from that movie ? For example (the most famous), you just have to mention the shower scene and most people associate it automatically to the movie. And the power of that scene. Talk about hitting somebody at its most vulnerable, and showing it too. Before Psycho you would be more likely to hear somebody take a shower, see someone get into the bathroom, hear screaming, and see the results afterwards. By showing it, you hit a very vulnerable spot in the audience : THERE ARE NO SAFE PLACES !
Psycho has got to be the first film that offers the sound effects of a guy spanking the monkey.
I’m not kidding. Look at the original version, and listen closely when Anthony Perkins is looking through the peep-hole. You hear him unzip his fly, do the five-knuckle chuckle for a minute, and then let out a disappointed, orgasmic sigh. Then, he zips up, and goes off to get Mom. The Van Sant version plays this up somewhat more than in the original. Ebert calls it an “addition”, but it’s there in the original, too.
I have seen some cuts of the film where this section is silenced, but I swear that on some versions, it’s there. Interestingly, Hitchcock seemed reticent to discuss that scene, while he enjoyed crowing about “train going into the tunnel” shot he snuck by the censors at the end of North by Northwest.