PSYCHO ESSAY

PSYCHO ESSAY

Our main character, Marion, has similar objectives to her boyfriend, Sam. They both wish to get married, but fear it will be too expensive. Later on in the story, we see a somewhat drunk rich man generously donate a sum of $40,000 in cash to Marion, who is told to put it in the bank. With very few options after getting seen by her boss, she decides to head out of time and abandon her lover, Sam. This money obviously disrupts her objectives; which now are to get out of town and selfishly start a new life with the money she had received. She eventually hits a small empty Motel, called the Bates Motel. There she meets the friendly and not-at-all-creepy Norman Bates who runs the Motel on his own, as well as caring for his Mother who lives in a house just up the hill, with her Son Norman. Norman seems to just wants to make a living and care for his mother, who we find Norman has a special relationship with. When Mother murders Marion, Norman like a good son cleans up for her by disposing of the body, car and cleaning the Motel. Norman starts to become a disposer for the killings that Mother commits. When they learn of Marion's disappearance, Sam and Marion's Sister (Lila) try to find the wealthy and missing Marion, which then leads they to finding what Norman is really hiding and what he done with Marion.

The films use of camera is what makes it so great, mysterious and just an overall iconic film. With most of the deaths, we see Mother committing the murder. So if this were a conventional film, we would have seen that his Mother was actually dead all along. In Psycho, we hear her and see her from behind, never from the front. Additionally, when she speaks we never she her face and as an audience we are never positioned in a way where be can identify this mysterious woman's facial features. Very subtly, we just see her silhouettes or the back of her hair, so we never question if she is actually committing these murders. Doing this makes the ending very memorable and revealing to the audience.

The narration in this film is definitely Restricted, toward the end of the film, we never see Norman or his mother and instead follow the detective skills of Sam and Lila as they investigate the Motel desperately trying to find Marion. We are never really locked on the life of one person (otherwise we would have been watching Marion's enclosed, bleeding dead body in the trunk of a car for an hour). Which is why Marion's death comes as a surprise to the audience as we follow her for the starter of the film and are tricked that the narration is about her life only.

The example of disorientation used in the film is when the audience is positioned in a Point of view shot when Marion is being observed by Norman through a hole in the wall. Until this point, we had just been following Marion's story, this is a subtle foreshadow of future events. The audience, in a turn of events, is uncontrollable positioned in a position where we are observing Marion in a voyeuristic fashion. This raises questions for the audience like: Why is he watching her? , What's going to happen next?. However, these questions are practically forgotten about when in the next scene a mysterious figure approaches the shower curtain and shockingly kills Marion.

I would say the main action code is Marion receiving the $40,000. This allows her to flee the town and start a new life, ultimately being the main Action code for the developing plot. When she gets it, the audience instantly ask questions like: What will she do with the money? , Where will she go?. One of the main Enigma codes is the famous shower scene, the audience are left with an uncomfortable extreme close up of our main characters lifeless eye. It slowly zooms out, raising a lot of questions for the audience: What will happen next? ,  Is she really dead? , Will she recover?. Leaving the audience is disbelief.

Using Todorov's theory of Narrative, the Disruption would be the large sum of money that Marion is given from a slightly drunken rich man. The attempt to repair would be Sam and Lila tracking Marion down, and the final Reinstatement of new equilibrium would be a world without crazy Norman but the knowledge that his murders have been solved. Throughout the film Hitchcock challenges the audience with MacGuffins; the audience is convinced that the story line will resolve around the money and how it plays an important significance in the story line. In the end though it ends up being pushed in a pond near Marion's dead corpse.

There are major surprises regarding the audiences exceptions of the characters. Using Propp's character types, the audience presumes that the private detective will get down to the bottom of the case and solve the mystery of the unknown murderer. These types characters are usually seen as 'Heros' (Who eventually save the day), but Hitchcock surprises the audience by suddenly killing this character suddenly and we never hear from him again.

The main theme in Psycho in Predator versus Prey. This theme is not just supported by the plot but by foreshadowing mise-en-scene devices. In most shots Marion is seen as vulnerable in various shots, the main one being where she is being observed, unknown to her, by Norman via a tiny spy hole. At this point in the story the Audience ask questions like: What does he have planned for her?. There is a use of mise-en-scene in a section that supports this theme. When Marion enters Norman's office there are birds of prey in the background, in attack-like positions, of course the audience realize that these birds are not real, but are instead part of Normans hobby; taxidermy. These birds of prey reinforce the Predator versus Prey theme.

The biggest build up of tension was the sinister, annoying loud violin music that would play suddenly in scenes where there is an absence of music. Towards the end of the film, this music is usually followed up by a sudden murder. Hitchcock purposely chose to film in Black and White to focus on the suspense of the film more, black and white also gives a general creepiness to the film.