ipl-logo

Violence In Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho

1861 Words8 Pages

“Psycho” (1960) is a horror suspense film that is known and remembered by many generations. Marion Crane, the protagonist, is a sectary that steals money from her employer’s client and takes that money and runs to California. While on her way to California she makes a stop at Bates Motel and gets a room. When she arrives she meets the owner Norman Bates. Norman in the beginning of the film starts out as friendly and welcoming, but later the audience sees his psychotic tendencies. These psychotic tendencies are shown through his fascination with his mother. Later, the viewers will see the killer is Norman. Norman lives close by to the motel with his overbearing mother. When you look up at the house there is usually an outline of a women’s body …show more content…

An article from Stephen Robb, is an article containing the many different ways “Psycho” has changed/-influenced cinema over the past 50 years. In the first part of the article it talks about how the graphic violence of the shower scene from the movie has opened up the different levels of violence shown in cinema. This scene was interesting to analyze compared to past scenes analyzed because the film was shot in black in white. Watching a black and white scene can completely change the audience’s reactions. For example in the shower scene in “Psycho” the stabbing could have had a lot less emotions to the audience because the blood was not a vivid red showing, it was just in black in white. Hitchcock states “one reason he shot Psycho in black-and-white was because he thought the bloody murder might be too much for audiences” (Nixon). In contrast, Hitchcock’s black and white film adds suspense and mystery through the use of his camera angles and music. By Hitchcock using high-pitched alarming music, it makes the audience frightened, causing them to have a natural reaction. Also, by Hitchcock using short cuts for his camera angles and not by filming the actual murder it leaves the audience curious about what is happening. It leaves the audience with the thought of the murder happening rather than seeing it happen. Robb goes on the describe the use of music in the movie “Psycho” and how it was a huge eye opener to the audience and other movie producers in the making of films. After Hitchcock used frantic and high-pitched panic sounding music during the killing of Marion, this made the audience react in a frightened way. This is something movie producers started to use to attract their audience and draw them in so they would have a

Show More
Related
222 Words | 1 Pages

Hitchcock utilizes sound, camera work, MacGuffins, and plot twists to tell the storylines of the movies. Hitchcock understood the importance of camera work and sound because he began his career making silent films.12 It is why he uses many close up shots so the audience can pay attention to specific details and the emotions on the character’s face. He does not rely on dialogue to tell the story. He uses sound to help convey the message of a scene.

Read More
238 Words | 1 Pages

Norman Bates and Hannibal Lecter both have psychological problems that cause them to become psycho killers. Norman Bates is a nervous, edgy and manipulative character who displayed several mental personalities where he hears his mother’s voice inside his head. When Morgan Crane arrives at the Bates motel, she decides to request a room because of the pouring rain. Morgan hears a conversation between Norman and his mother arguing about her while she’s in the room. As Morgan is taking a shower, someone enters in the bathroom and stabs her to death.

Read More
178 Words | 1 Pages

“My scientific studies have afforded me great gratification; and I am convinced that it will not be long before the whole world acknowledges the results of my work” (Biography.com Editors). Gregor Mendel changed history by how he was the one who discovered the principles of heredity. Gregor Mendel marked history when he discovered genetics and how they work. He was the man known as “The Father of Modern Genetics” (The Doc). He is worthy of research because we would not know that we get our traits from our parents, or how it happens.

Read More
425 Words | 2 Pages

Alfred Hitchcock is remembered as the "master of suspense", most notably in one of his cinemas, "Psycho". Hitchcock used a variety of sensory details, to shock moreover frighten his audience. Three sensory details that he used, is when we notice a cop following Marion, we see that Norman is stalking Marion, and when a shadowy figure shows up while Marion is taking a shower. The first sensory detail that creates suspense is when we see the cop following Marion. We believe that the cop recognizes something is up furthermore, is going to assert Marion for stealing the money.

Read More
1072 Words | 5 Pages

Comparison of the “Psycho” and “A Rose for Emily” The Psycho by Alfred Hitchcock and A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner are works with different plots and endings. The movie is focused on a maniac, who recreated an image of his mother to kill visitors. Norman Bates killed own mother because he thought she “betrayed” him, and used her personality in his further crimes. The man was caught and his actions were revealed long before his death.

Read More
810 Words | 4 Pages

In the beginning of the movie they used suspenseful music and imagery to keep the viewer more interested and make the viewer want to know what the “Secret” is and this is part of the logical chain of reasoning known as Pathos. Pathos is

Read More
539 Words | 3 Pages

Alfred Hitchcock’s film Vertigo (1958) was voted the “best film ever made” by the 2012 British Film Institute, and for good reason. The plot is elaborate and intriguing and the cinematography is legendary. On top of this, the characters, like good characters should, all have their own needs and wants that are evident in the film. The needs of these characters affect each other and they affect the story and they all follow one common theme: control. Our protagonist, John “Scottie” Ferguson’s wants and needs differ greatly throughout the film, but his only constant is his yearning to get over his acrophobia, or fear of heights.

Read More
657 Words | 3 Pages

For example, when Jeff overhears the bickering between Mr. and Mrs. Thorwald, it reminds him of his own fears about commitment and marriage. Hitchcock masterfully used an abundance of noise and the almost complete absence of sound to affect the suspense in these two

Read More
656 Words | 3 Pages

This sense of normality shows the difference between reality and the dream. With this sense of normality, many people don’t like to watch these horror movies as it is too scary. However, this shows the sense of normality as it shows the emotions of being scared. On the other hand, the other people show the emotions of

Read More
929 Words | 4 Pages

This part of the movie is shown in color, to show the beauty of what is past the walls of their closed-in community. For many patients, musicophilia is developed at an older age, and for some of them, the time before they noticed it was black and white. After, it was all in color. I argue with the idea that musicophilia is a disorder. The American Psychiatric Association (APA) has wrestled with the definition of a disorder.

Read More
1664 Words | 7 Pages

Another example of a horror film that uses music to convey a sense of fear that runs down the spine of everyone in the audience is The Silence of the Lambs. As the villain is stalking the detective, the lights go out and the music gets louder and builds the suspense of what the stalker will do to his victim. The use of loud percussive sounds intensives the scene and the higher pitched music puts fear into the

Read More
772 Words | 4 Pages

Andrew Slawson Professor Morowitz HNRS 353 1 September 2014 American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis The 1991 novel American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis is a satirical story detailing the daily life and internal monologue of late-1980s New York City businessman and serial killer Patrick Bateman, a man devoid of empathy and obsessed with how he presents himself to others. Most of the novel is told in a stream-of-consciousness style from the unreliable point of view of the protagonist, and mistaken identity is a consistent theme throughout the novel. As a result, it becomes difficult to determine whether the events that take place are the delusions of Bateman’s psychotic mind or actual facets of reality.

Read More
132 Words | 1 Pages

Being offered a role to portray the villain or the hero in a movie would be an obvious choice – I’d take the role of the mysterious, dark, antithetical villain any day. The majority says that the villain is evil, on the contrary the villain, in reality, characterizes the opposite of the meritorious hero. To illustrate: The hero symbolizes sanity and morality; the villain is insanity and moral corruption. The hero wants tranquility, the villain desires incompatibility. Moreover, the villain typifies a shadow-like form as analogous to that of an alter ego of the hero.

Read More
1478 Words | 6 Pages

Like, we can see that the use of red and black color adds suspense and thriller elements in the movie. Mostly, the characters in the movie can be seen wearing red color dress and when Cole gets thrilling experiences of ghost it is mostly shown under the red light. Some of the scene of darkness and low-light are also shown to further thrill the viewers. Mostly the picture of fear and terror can be seen through Cole's eyes. In most of the part of the film he can be seen scared and nervous.

Read More
774 Words | 4 Pages

However, film critic, Robin Wood, argues that ‘since Psycho, the Hollywood cinema has implicitly recognised horror as both American and familial’ he then goes on to connect this with Psycho by claiming that it is an “innovative and influential film because it supposedly presents its horror not as the produce of forces outside American society, bit a product of the patriarchal family which is the fundamental institution of American society” he goes on to discuss how our civilisation either represses or oppresses (Skal, 1994). Woods claim then suggests that in Psycho, it is the repressions and tensions within the normal American family which produces the monster, not some alien force which was seen and suggested throughout the 1950 horror films. At the beginning of the 60’s, feminisation was regarded as castration not humanization. In “Psycho” (1960) it is claimed that the film presents conservative “moral lessons about gender roles of that the strong male is healthy and normal and the sensitive male is a disturbed figure who suffers from gener confusion” (Skal, 1994). In this section of this chapter I will look closely at how “Psycho” (1960) has layers of non-hetro-conforming and gender-non conforming themes through the use of Norman Bates whose gender identitiy is portrayed as being somewhere between male and female

Read More

More about Violence In Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho

Related Topics

Open Document