Psycho
A Thematic Analysis of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho has been commended for forming the archetypical basis of all horror films that followed its 1960 release. The mass appeal that Psycho has maintained for over three decades can undoubtedly be attributed to its universality. In Psycho, Hitchcock allows the audience to become a subjective character within the plot to enhance the film's psychological effects for an audience that is forced to recognise its own neurosis and psychological inadequacies as it is comp elled to identify, for varying lengths of time, with the contrasting personalities of the film's main characters. Hitchcock conveys an intensifying theme in Psycho, that bases itself on the unending subconscious battle between good and evil that exists in everyone through the audience's subjective participation and implicit character parallels. Psycho begins with a view of a city that is arbitrarily identified along with an exact date and time. The camera, seemingly at random, chooses first one of the man y buildings and then one of the many windows to explore before the audience is introduced to Marion and Sam. Hitchcock's use of random selection creates a sense of normalcy for the audien
The clash between Marion and Norman, although not apparent to the audience until the end of the film, is one of neurosis versus psychosis. The suspicion and animosity that Marion feels while at the motel is felt by the audience. The audience, now in a vulnerable state looks to Norman to replace Marion as its main focus in its subjective role. The conflict that arises between Sam and Norman reflects the fact that Sam had what Norman wanted but was unable to attain due to his psychotic nature. The fact that the city and room were arbitrarily identified impresses upon the audience that their own lives could randomly be applied to the events that are about to follow. The audience is reassured, however, when Marion, upon returning to her room, decides to return the money and face the consequences of her actions. When Sam and Lila venture to the Bates Motel to investigate both Marion's and Arbogast's disappearances, Hitchcock presents the audience with more character parallels. The split personality motif reaches the height of its foreshadowing power as Marion battles both sides of her conscience while driving on an ominous and seemingly endless road toward the Bates Motel. The shift from the normal to the abnormal is not apparent to the audience in the parlour scene but the audience is later forced to disturbingly reexamine its own conscience and character judgment a bilities to discover why Norman's predicament seemed more worthy of its sympathy than Marion's. Despite the fact that Arbogast interrupts Norman's seemingly innocent existence the audience does not perceive him as an annoyance as they had the interrogative policeman who had hindered Marion's journey. Upon the introduction of Norman, Hitchcock introduces the first of several characte r parallels within Psycho. Psycho concludes by providing a blatant explanation for Norman's psychotic tendencies. After Marion and Norman finish dining, Hitchcock has secured the audience's empathy for Norman and the audience is made to question its previous relationship with Marion whose criminal behaviour does not compare to Norman's seemingly honest and respectable lifestyle. Fa ced with this spectacle, Hitchcock forces the audience to examine its conscious self in relation to the events that it had just subjectively played a role in.
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Acceptance Essays
