Psycho is a 1960 American horror film produced and directed by Alfred Hitchcock. The screenplay, written by Joseph Stefano, was based on the 1959 novel of the same name by Robert Bloch. The film stars Anthony Perkins, Janet Leigh, Vera Miles, John Gavin, and Martin Balsam. The plot centers on an encounter between on-the-run embezzler Marion Crane (Leigh) and shy motel proprietor Norman Bates (Perkins) and its aftermath, in which a private investigator (Balsam), Marion's lover Sam Loomis (Gavin), and her sister Lila (Miles) investigate her disappearance.[8]
Psycho was seen as a departure from Hitchcock's previous film North by Northwest, as it was filmed on a small budget in black-and-white by the crew of his television series Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Initially, the film divided critics due to its controversial subject matter, but audience interest and outstanding box-office returns prompted a major critical re-evaluation. Psycho was nominated for four Academy Awards, including Best Director for Alfred Hitchcock and Best Supporting Actress for Janet Leigh.
Psycho is now considered one of Hitchcock's best films,[b] and is arguably his most famous and influential work.[9] It has been hailed as a major work of cinematic art by international film critics and scholars who praise its slick direction, tense atmosphere, impressive camerawork, memorable score and iconic performances. Often ranked among the greatest films of all time, it set a new level of acceptability for violence, deviant behavior and sexuality in American films,[10] and has been considered to be one of the earliest examples of the slasher film genre. After Hitchcock's death in 1980, Universal Pictures produced follow-ups: three sequels, a remake, a made-for-television spin-off, and a television series. In 1992, the Library of Congress deemed the film "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" and selected it for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.[11][12]
Phoenix real estate secretary Marion Crane steals $40,000 cash from her employer after hearing her boyfriend, Sam, complain that his debts are delaying their marriage. She sets off to drive to Sam's home in Fairvale, California, and switches cars after she encounters a suspicious policeman. A heavy rainstorm forces Marion to stop at the Bates Motel just a few miles from Fairvale. Norman Bates, the proprietor, whose Second Empire style house overlooks the motel, registers Marion (who uses an alias) and invites her to eat with him in the motel's office. When Norman returns to his house to retrieve the food, Marion hears him arguing with his mother about his desire to dine with Marion. After he returns, he discusses his hobby as a taxidermist, his mother's "illness", and how people have a "private trap" they want to escape. When Marion suggests that Norman should have his mother institutionalized, he becomes greatly offended and insists that she's harmless. Marion decides to drive back to Phoenix in the morning to return the stolen money. As she showers, a shadowy figure enters the bathroom and stabs her to death. Shortly afterward, Norman comes to check on Marion, only to discover her dead body. Horrified, he hurriedly cleans up the murder scene. He then puts Marion's body, her belongings, and unbeknownst to him, the hidden cash in her car, then sinks the car in a swamp.
Marion's sister Lila arrives in Fairvale a week later, tells Sam about the theft, and demands to know where Marion is. He denies knowing anything about her disappearance. A private investigator named Arbogast approaches them, saying that he has been hired to retrieve the money. He stops at the Bates Motel and questions Norman, whose nervous behavior, stuttering, and inconsistent answers arouse his suspicion. He examines the guest register and discovers from her handwriting that Marion spent a night in the motel. When Arbogast infers from Norman that Marion had spoken to his mother, he asks to speak to her, but Norman refuses to allow it. After Arbogast enters the Bates home to search for Norman's mother, the shadowy figure assaults him at the top of the stairs and stabs him to death.
When Sam and Lila do not hear back from Arbogast, Sam goes to the motel to look for him. He sees a figure in the house who he assumes is Norman's mother. Lila and Sam alert the local sheriff, Al Chambers, who tells them Norman's mother died in a murder-suicide by strychnine poisoning ten years earlier. Chambers suggests that Arbogast lied to Sam and Lila so he could pursue Marion and the money. Convinced that something happened to Arbogast, Lila and Sam drive to the motel. Sam distracts Norman in the office while Lila sneaks into the house. Suspicious, Norman knocks Sam unconscious. As he goes to the house, Lila hides in the fruit cellar, where she discovers the mummified body of Norman's mother. Lila screams in horror, and Norman, wearing women's clothes and a wig, enters the cellar and tries to stab her. Sam appears and subdues him.
At the police station, a psychiatrist explains that Norman killed his mother and her lover ten years earlier out of jealousy. Unable to bear the guilt, he mummified his mother's corpse and treated it as if she were still alive. He recreated his mother as an alternate personality, as jealous and possessive towards Norman as he felt about his mother. Whenever Norman is attracted to a woman, "Mother" takes over. He killed two women before he killed Marion and Arbogast. The psychiatrist concludes that "Mother" has now submerged Norman's personality. Norman sits in a jail cell and hears his mother's voice saying the murders were all his doing. Marion's car, which contains her remains and the stolen money, is retrieved from the swamp.
Virginia Gregg, Paul Jasmin, and Jeanette Nolan make uncredited appearances as the voice of Norma "Mother" Bates. The three voices were used interchangeably, except for the speech in the final scene, which was performed entirely by Gregg.[13]
Psycho is based on Robert Bloch's 1959 novel of the same name, loosely inspired by the case of convicted Wisconsin murderer and grave robber Ed Gein.[14] Both Gein, who lived only 40 miles (64 km) from Bloch, and the story's protagonist Norman Bates, were solitary murderers in isolated rural locations. Each had deceased, domineering mothers, had sealed off a room in their home as a shrine to them, and dressed in women's clothes. Gein was apprehended after killing only twice.[15][16]
Peggy Robertson, Hitchcock's long-time assistant, read Anthony Boucher's positive review of the novel in his "Criminals at Large" column in The New York Times and decided to show the book to her employer; however, studio readers at Paramount Pictures had already rejected its premise for a film.[17] Hitchcock acquired rights to the novel for $9,500[18] and reportedly ordered Robertson to buy all copies to preserve the novel's surprises.[17] Hitchcock, who had come to face genre competitors whose works were critically compared to his own, was seeking new material to recover from two aborted projects with Paramount: Flamingo Feather and No Bail for the Judge. He disliked stars' salary demands and trusted only a few people to choose prospective material, including Robertson.[19]
Paramount executives balked at Hitchcock's proposal and refused to provide his usual budget.[20] In response, Hitchcock offered to film Psycho quickly and cheaply in black and white using his Alfred Hitchcock Presents television series crew. Paramount executives rejected this cost-conscious approach, claiming their sound stages were booked, but the industry was in a slump. Hitchcock countered that he personally would finance the project and film it at Universal-International using his Shamley Productions crew if Paramount would distribute. In lieu of his usual $250,000 director's fee, he proposed a 60% stake in the film negative. This combined offer was accepted, and Hitchcock went ahead in spite of naysaying from producer Herbert Coleman and Shamley Productions executive Joan Harrison.[21]
James P. Cavanagh, a writer on Alfred Hitchcock Presents, wrote the first draft of the screenplay.[22] Hitchcock felt the script dragged and read like a television short horror story,[23] an assessment shared by an assistant.[22] Although Joseph Stefano had worked on only one film before, Hitchcock agreed to meet with him; despite Stefano's inexperience, the meeting went well and he was hired.[22]
The screenplay is relatively faithful to the novel, with a few significant changes by Hitchcock and Stefano. Stefano found the character of Norman Bates unsympathetic—in the book, he is middle-aged, overweight, and more overtly unstable—but became more intrigued when Hitchcock suggested casting Anthony Perkins.[23] Stefano eliminated Bates' drinking,[24] which necessitated removing Bates' "becoming" the mother personality when in a drunken stupor. Also gone is Bates' interest in spiritualism, the occult, and pornography.[25] Hitchcock and Stefano elected to open the film with scenes in Marion's life and not introduce Bates at all until 20 minutes into the film rather than open with Bates reading a history book as Bloch does.[24] Writer Joseph W. Smith observes that "her story occupies only two of the novel's 17 chapters. Hitchcock and Stefano expanded this to nearly half the narrative".[26]
He likewise mentions the absence of a hotel tryst between Marion and Sam in the novel. For Stefano, the conversation between Marion and Norman in the hotel parlor in which she displays maternal sympathy towards him makes it possible for the audience to switch their sympathies towards Norman Bates after Marion's murder.[27] When Lila Crane is looking through Norman's room in the film, she opens a book with a blank cover whose contents are unseen; in the novel, these are "pathologically pornographic" illustrations. Stefano wanted to give the audience "indications that something was quite wrong, but it could not be spelled out or overdone."[27] In his book of conversations with Hitchcock, François Truffaut says the novel "cheats" by having extended conversations between Norman and "Mother" and stating what Mother is "doing" at various given moments.[28]
The first name of the female protagonist was changed from Mary to Marion because a real Mary Crane existed in Phoenix.[29] Also changed is the novel's budding romance between Sam and Lila. Hitchcock preferred to focus the audience's attention on the solution to the mystery,[30] and Stefano thought such a relationship would make Sam Loomis seem cheap.[27] Instead of having Sam explain Norman's pathology to Lila, the film uses a psychiatrist.[31] Stefano was in therapy dealing with his relationship with his own mother while writing the script.[32] The novel is more violent than the film: Marion is beheaded in the shower rather than being stabbed to death.[22] Minor changes include changing Marion's telltale earring found after her death to a scrap of paper that failed to flush down the toilet. This provided some shock effect because toilets almost were never seen in American cinema in the 1960s.[33] The location of Arbogast's death was moved from the foyer to the stairwell. Stefano thought this would make it easier to conceal the truth about "Mother" without tipping that something was being hidden.[34] As Janet Leigh put it, this gave Hitchcock more options for his camera.[31]
Paramount, whose contract guaranteed another film by Hitchcock, did not want Hitchcock to make Psycho. Paramount was expecting No Bail for the Judge starring Audrey Hepburn, who became pregnant and had to bow out, leading Hitchcock to scrap the production. Their official stance was that the book was "too repulsive" and "impossible for films," and nothing but another of his star-studded mystery thrillers would suffice.[18][35] They did not like "anything about it at all" and denied him his usual budget.[18][35] In response Hitchcock financed the film's creation through his own Shamley Productions, shooting at Universal Studios under the Revue television unit.[20][36] The original Bates Motel and Bates house set buildings, which were constructed on the same stage as Lon Chaney's The Phantom of the Opera, are still standing at the Universal Studios backlot in Universal City near Hollywood and are a regular attraction on the studio's tour.[37][38] As a further result of cost-cutting, Hitchcock chose to film Psycho in black and white, keeping the budget under $1 million.[39] Other reasons for shooting in black and white were his desire to prevent the shower scene from being too gory.[40]
To keep costs down, and because he was most comfortable around them, Hitchcock took most of his crew from his television series Alfred Hitchcock Presents, including cinematographer John L. Russell, set designer George Milo, script supervisor Marshall Schlom, and assistant director Hilton A. Green.[41] He hired regular collaborators Bernard Herrmann as the music composer, George Tomasini as editor, and Saul Bass for the title design and storyboarding of the shower scene. In all, his crew cost $62,000.[42]
Through the strength of his reputation, Hitchcock cast Leigh for a quarter of her usual fee, paying only $25,000 (in the 1967 book Hitchcock/Truffaut, Hitchcock said that Leigh owed Paramount one final film on her seven-year contract which she had signed in 1953).[43] His first choice, Leigh agreed having only read the novel and making no inquiry into her salary.[29] Her co-star, Anthony Perkins, agreed to $40,000.[42] Both stars were experienced and proven box-office draws.[44]
Paramount distributed the film, but four years later Hitchcock sold his stock in Shamley to Universal's parent company (MCA) and his remaining six films were made at and distributed by Universal Pictures.[36] After another four years, Paramount sold all rights to Universal.[36]
The film, independently produced[45][46] and financed by Hitchcock, was shot at Revue Studios,[47] the same location as his television show. Psycho was shot on a tight budget of $807,000,[48] beginning on November 11, 1959, and ending on February 1, 1960.[49][50] Filming started in the morning and finished by six p.m. or earlier on Thursdays (when Hitchcock and his wife would dine at Chasen's).[51] Nearly the whole film was shot with 50 mm lenses on 35 mm cameras. This provided an angle of view similar to human vision, which helped to further involve the audience.[52]
Before shooting began in November, Hitchcock dispatched Green to Phoenix to scout locations and shoot the opening scene. The shot was supposed to be an aerial shot of Phoenix that slowly zoomed into the hotel window of a passionate Marion and Sam. Ultimately, the helicopter footage proved too shaky and had to be spliced with footage from the studio.[53] Another crew filmed day and night footage on Highway 99 between Gorman and Fresno, California for projection when Marion drives from Phoenix. Footage of her driving into Bakersfield to trade her car is also shown.
They also provided the location shots for the scene in which she is discovered sleeping in her car by the highway patrolman.[53] In one street scene shot in downtown Phoenix, Christmas decorations were discovered to be visible; rather than re-shoot the footage, Hitchcock chose to add a graphic to the opening scene marking the date as "Friday, December the Eleventh".[54]
Green also took photos of a prepared list of 140 locations for later reconstruction in the studio. These included many real estate offices and homes such as those belonging to Marion and her sister.[53] He also found a girl who looked just as he imagined Marion and photographed her whole wardrobe, which would enable Hitchcock to demand realistic looks from Helen Colvig, the wardrobe supervisor.[53] The look of the Bates house was modeled on Edward Hopper's painting House by the Railroad,[55] a fanciful portrait of the Second Empire Victorian home at 18 Conger Avenue in Haverstraw, New York.[56]
Lead actors Perkins and Leigh were given the freedom to interpret their roles and improvise as long as it did not involve moving the camera.[57] An example of Perkins's improvisation is Norman's habit of eating candy corn.[58] Throughout filming, Hitchcock created and hid various versions of the "Mother corpse" prop in Leigh's dressing room closet. Leigh took the joke well, and she wondered whether it was done to keep her in suspense or to judge which corpse would be scarier for the audience.[59]
Hitchcock was forced uncharacteristically to do retakes for some scenes. The final shot in the shower scene, which starts with an extreme close-up on Marion's eye and zooms in and out, proved difficult for Leigh because the water splashing in her eyes made her want to blink, and the cameraman had trouble as well because he had to manually focus while moving the camera.[57] Retakes were required for the opening scene because Hitchcock felt that Leigh and Gavin were not passionate enough.[60] Leigh had trouble saying "Not inordinately" for the real estate office scene, requiring additional retakes.[61] Lastly, the scene in which "Mother" is discovered required complicated coordination of the chair turning around, Vera Miles (as Lila Crane) hitting the light bulb, and a lens flare, which proved to be difficult. Hitchcock forced retakes until all three elements were effected to his satisfaction.[62]
According to Hitchcock, a series of shots with Arbogast going up the stairs in the Bates house before he is stabbed were directed by Green based on Bass' storyboards while Hitchcock was incapacitated by the common cold. However, upon viewing the dailies of the shots, Hitchcock was forced to scrap them. He claimed they were "no good" because they did not portray "an innocent person but a sinister man who was going up those stairs".[63] Hitchcock later re-shot the scene, though a little of the cut footage made its way into the film. Filming the murder of Arbogast proved problematic, owing to the overhead camera angle necessary to hide the film's twist. A camera track constructed on pulleys alongside the stairway together with a chair-like device had to be constructed and thoroughly tested over a period of weeks.[64]
Alfred Hitchcock's cameo is a signature occurrence in most of his films. In Psycho, he can be seen through a window