Psycho Essay

Psycho Essay

by

Niamh Gallagher

Alfred Hitchcock’s thriller Psycho uses many different types of narratives to drive the plot. Examples used by the director are the way he lights things, camera shots, music used and how he follow certain theories such as Todorov’s and Propp’s. I will be exploring these in this essay

At the start the narration and for the first forty-six minutes the narrative is restricted as it locked to Marion's perspective but after her murder it splits of to Lila, Sam and Arbogast's viewpoints. The use of restricted narration is useful as it creates an anticipation for the murderer to be caught and identity to be revealed, Hitchcock being a master of suspense. Nearly every scene in which Marion is in a close-up is used, as an audience we are placed close to her to form a relationship. This also creates enigma codes such as 'who murdered Marion?’ 'What was the purpose of killing her?’ and 'what will happen to the $40,000 Marion stole'.  

Hitchcock challenges the norms of narratives as he surprises audiences expectations in regards to roles of characters as the 'damsel in distress' character type, (Marion), is not saved as this shocks us as an audience. This is because we're used to the 'hero' character saving her but Hitchcock changes this aspect and thus this shocks the audience, as it is an expected twist. The whole point of Psycho's narrative is to shock and challenge the audience's expectations. After Marion's murder as audience we feel upset as the narrative had been following her for the previous forty-six minutes as we had begun to like her character so as an audience we cling to nearest character, that being Norman Bates. The director also uses the camera to manipulate the audiences point of view as Hitchcock uses stranger camera angles to give a sense of unease that goes on to create nerve-breaking tension and suspense. This also makes the audience uncomfortable and squirmy as the uncanny angles create a sense of unease. 

The technical codes used by Alfred Hitchcock make Psycho an interesting visual imagery. The music is a key aspect on how the director creates tension. As the scene becomes more the tense, the dramatic music heightens into a climatic shill, such as in the shower scene. The music is uncomfortable and sharp and shrieking on the audience's ears, adding to the horror of the scene. The music has become utterly iconic due to the frightful recognisable quality of it. Another technical code being used by Hitchcock is the lighting, an example being the parlour scene. Norman's face is split into two half's; one dark and one light. This is a metaphor for his two personalities, it is hinted during the film that he suffers with schizophrenia. The light half represents the mild-mannered Norman Bates while the darken area is the 'Mother' personality which is where the evil and callousness stems from. Hitchcock uses sound, or rather no sound, in another interesting use of technical codes. In the parlour scene the director doesn’t use any music soundtrack in the scene, which adds to the uncomfortable atmosphere, thus creating tension. This helps drive the narrative as the audience start to worry for Marion whom they have come to care for as the situation appears to be taking a sinister turn.

Todorov’s theory can be seen in this film when Marion takes the money, causing a disruption that drives the plot, breaks the equilibrium. The recognition that there has been disruption would be were Marion is in her car, hallucinating the voices of all who are affected by her theft of the money. She realises what she has done wrong but is too frightened of the consequences to turn back and rectify her wrongs. Meanwhile the attempt to repair the damage of the disruption is when Marion decides to take the money but tragically killed violently before doing so. This creates a new equilibrium of who murdered Marion and the reason why they did so.

Personally I believe that Alfred Hitchcock filmed Psycho is black and white as it gives the film a sinister lot to it. Black and white connotes with old movies, many of these being horror films such as Nosferatu. By using the black and white the film appears chilling which helps give the film its notoriously eerie and horrifying vibe as the shadows appear even darker, even more terrifying.