Psycho is without doubt a masterpiece. The director, Hitchcock, deliberately used many devices and techniques to inject suspense and horror into the audience.
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Introduction
Psycho Psycho is without doubt a masterpiece. The director, Hitchcock, deliberately used many devices and techniques to inject suspense and horror into the audience. One way that he did this was by using clever camera angles. Another was how he made use of fast-moving camera angles and sound to a good effect. One of the factors that makes Psycho a good film was that it is not predictable, for instance the main character and biggest star in the film, dies a third of the way into the film, plus all through the film little red herrings and unexpected plot twists are thrown in eg. the money was a red herring. All the red herrings and twists improve the film and make it more tense. Hitchcock was a master at positioning the camera angle, he could get it so that it could create suspense and horror and not give anything away at the same time. Another noticeable style of Hitchcock's was the speed that everything went at, all the horror and scary parts were built up slowly and weren't sudden. ...read more.
Middle
The blood was also the main reason for the movie being in black and white rather than colour because Hitchcock knew that it wouldn't pass the censors if it was in colour. Another show of symbolism was the eyes of Norman when he was peeping into Marion's room and Marion's eyes when the camera slowly moves out from in the shower, immediately after the murder. Hitchcock's style is definitely slow whilst building up suspense and conning the audience to think and feel what he wants, this is shown when Norman is clearing up after the murder, he is doing so very slowly and methodically, so that the atmosphere is very tense and the audience are manipulated into wanting Norman to succeed in cleaning up the evidence because they see him as a scared young man protecting his mother and they think that he wouldn't hurt anyone. The scene with Arbogast's death is a fine example of Hitchcock's excellent directing. He started by showing another full - face shot whilst he is taking off his hat and this makes him look more vulnerable. ...read more.
Conclusion
A further example of this is when Lila is looking around the house and she is moving very slowly around upstairs and Hitchcock is using shots reflected from a mirror. This is meant to confuse the audience and spook them. When she goes down to the cellar, this is where the fast editing and sound comes into the equation. Also, Hitchcock used a swinging light bulb to cast light and dark on the set; this was real genius as it increased the horror. One last example of Hitchcock's fine directing was at the very end when Norman was sitting in the police station and the camera was zooming in close to his face, just as the scene was about to change, he merged the skull of mother slightly with his face; this was obviously because he wanted the face to stick in the mind of the audience and haunt them. Overall, Hitchcock used a combination of camera trickery and admirable symbolism to produce a suspense classic that, not only is popular forty years on, but has inspired other more recent horror films. ...read more.
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