A mesmerizing and stunning film, Psycho was released in nineteen-sixty in black and white, because Hitchcock believed the film would be too graphic for color. Film censors were stunned with the movie's depiction of sexual content, nudity, and violence in a way previously considered taboo. Psycho is one of the few films from its era to have retained an R rating to this day. This testifies to the film's unflinching portrayal of its disturbing subject matter.

Psycho deals heavily with the concept of mental illness and its representation and consequences in culture. Norman Bates is a seemingly normal hotel manager under the iron-eye of an overbearing "mother." He comes across as nearly pleasant to a fault in most circumstances, conversing in a needy and child-like manner with his single guest, Marion Crane. Marion responds politely to his demeanor as she is in need of a place to stay after having trouble with her car. However, the audience is alerted to the abnormality of the situation as Norman becomes defensive when confronted about his overbearing "mother" and by Norman's voyeuristic tendencies as he watches Marion undress in her room.

As the film progresses, we listen to Norman's "mother" demean him for becoming involved with a female, as he responds in his signature child-like manner. Norman's "mother" becomes convinced that this woman is not safe to leave alone with her son, so she decides to put a stop to their interaction. Whilst Marion is showering, the audience hears the now famous shrieking score. In possibly the most frantic scene ever filmed, the "mother" is revealed to be Norman. After swinging open the shower curtain, Norman, complete with wig and dagger, stabs Marion to death.

One could possibly spend an entire essay examining this single scene, but for the purposes of this paper, the explanation will only be a cursory one. The scene is filmed in a sequence of close-ups and quick cuts, mainly of Marion's face, arms, and legs. Through suggestion and convincing, diagetic sound effects, the audience is led to believe that they are literally watching Marion be stabbed to death. In reality, the knife is not once shown piercing the skin, and blood is nearly absent until Marion is shown laying dead with blood swirling down the drain. The scene ends with Marion staring lifelessly into the camera in a truly haunting scene.

Also of interest is the near-lack of nudity in the scene. By quickly cutting between face, arms, and legs, one is under the impression that they are seeing Marion nude. But this is only because of the quick cuts. If one were to watch the scene in half-time, it would become apparent that only one out-of-focus nude shot is even present.

After disposing of the body, investigation ensues. It is eventually revealed that Norman keeps his death mother in a chair in the basement, and treats her as if she were real. After an abusive and controlled childhood, Norman was unable to disconnect himself emotionally from his mother after her death, so he simply took on her role, splitting his personality into two distinct entities. It is of great note that the film's plot was inspired by Ed Gein, whose background and crimes were of a strikingly similar nature to those of Norman Bates.

Psycho works on multiple levels as a commentary on its period and an attempt to bring the concept of mental health to a higher level of discussion. While the film does not explicitly state its intentions, symptomatically this shocking portrayal of illness and death was going to open a dialog regarding mental health that could not be previously held in the public sphere.

After filming Psycho, it was reported that the use of the term "transvestite" was actually considered objectionable to the censor board, but Hitchcock refused to succumb to their wishes, as he had already duped them during the aforementioned shower scene by including extraneous footage for the censors to cut.

During the final scene, after the psychologist has met with the authorities and explained Norman's condition, the scene peers into Norman's padded cell. He is seen wearing a straight-jacket and muttering to himself. As the audience listens to the conversation, it becomes readily apparent that Norman is speaking in two distinct voices, those of him and his mother. He continues this disturbing conversation until he speaks a final line, then gazes into the camera with one of the most twisted and chilling expressions captured on film.

This scene serves to point out a crucial message conveyed symptomatically from the film, that those with Multiple Personality Disorder or Schizophrenia are somehow dangerous and demented. This is obviously a gross generalization, but Psycho treats this subject as if all individuals with said disorders are demented freaks of nature. As the culture in which this film premiered was generally unaware of psycho- and neurological disorders, this film was their first glimpse into the realm of mental illness, and it was a terrifying one.

The central character was depicted as a soulless killer, only able to be contained by a padded cell and straightjacket. The doctor, when describing the disorder, spent no time discussing the uniqueness of Norman's manifestation of his disorder, but seemed to give the impression that this behavior was typical of the mentally ill.

Also conveyed by this film is a higher level of gender equality than was typical of Hollywood. As the story plays out, it becomes a monster-movie of sorts, with Norman Bates as the seemingly unstoppable beast. But this is not a damsel-in-distress story, as a male investigator is stabbed to death in the same vicious manner as Marion. This set a new trend, not by exalting women, but rather by victimizing and questioning the control and authority of the patriarch.

Psycho is also unique in that it exposes the dangers of vulnerability in a way that equates vulnerability with victimization. As Marion changes her clothing, her vulnerable state arouses the desire of a homicidal maniac. Her decision to converse with Norman, allowing him a glimpse of her personal life, allows him to attach himself to her through her vulnerability. And in the most vulnerable act of all, she disrobes and separates herself from even the rest of the room by closing the curtain to take a shower.

As Hitchcock shows, her feeble attempt at juxtaposing vulnerability and privacy is compromised when Norman storms in and rips open the curtain, leaving her with only her vulnerability. At this moment, she is at her most vulnerable, and as Hitchcock would have his audience believe, most endangered state. With nothing but her vulnerability, she is murdered brutally in what is symptomatically a cautionary tale to the audience regarding their own vulnerability. In Hitchcock's world, safety is only achieved by the constant guarding of one's self against the often un-identifiable forces of malevolence.

In relationship to vulnerability, Psycho also has much to say on the concept of human relationships. One can see that Norman is a somewhat tragic example of the danger of vulnerability in the most vulnerable relationship of all, the one between mother and child. Norman is subjected for her abuse for years by leaving himself in a vulnerable state and accepting her abuse. This causes his extreme dependency that leads to his eventual illness and demise.

The mother can be seen as the true malevolent force of the movie, praying on Norman's vulnerability in such a way that she is allowed to live on through Norman and continue her reign over other innocent victims. So in effect, the mother is actually the true killer of Marion, at least in a metaphoric sense.

Lastly, this film is about the unknown and the fear that it inspires, not so much for the film's characters as for the audience. We can see this trend continue in films such as Alien, Jaws, Poltergeist, and a host of others. As was stated, this film was released in a time of relative ignorance on the part of the general public in relation to the subject of mental illness.

Rather than giving the audience a clear picture of mental illness from the start of the film, Hitchcock forces the audience to watch in suspense with no point of reference as character's are viciously murdered without explanation. And after the audience receives the final explanation, the last words are given to Norman Bates. So rather than allowing the audience to witness a full dialog on Norman's disorder, only a brief explanation is given, leading into the final scene of even more fear and confusion from this still misunderstood illness. As the film closes, Norman watches the audience, almost mocking their ignorance.

This is the genius of Hitchcock. He consistently finds unexplored topics, or those most filmmakers would not dare explore, and constructs fantastical yet grounded accounts of their horrifying effects of humanity. In the wake of such films, a dialog is opened, leading to new knowledge and awareness. Rarely before or since has a filmmaker put such a progressive step forward and left such a historic mark on the realm of cinema.

The storyline of this film involves a young woman who steals $40,000 from her employer's client, and ends up on a personal odyssey towards terror when she encounters a disturbed young hotel proprietor who is dominated by his mother. Patrick McGilligan (2003) wrote that the Bates character was based on Wisconsin serial killer Ed Gein, who may have had an incestuous relationship with his mother. (McGilligan, 2003. Page 579)

One of the biggest signifiers in the film is cash. Money is the initial drive that leads the main character, banker Marion Crane (played by Janet Leigh), down a path towards her own destruction. What is signified is the power that money and greed have over people, and how you pay a price for succumbing to its powers.

Facing a paradigmatic structure composed of desiring to marry her boyfriend, but lacking the finances to do so, Crane stumbles upon a solution when a rich oil tycoon enters the office and asks Crane to deposit $40,000 cash in the bank. (Berger, p. 24) While driving to the bank, Crane dreams of how the money could help alleviate her repressed desire to escape a boring job and set her free to flee the state and go on a fairy tale romance.

The oil tycoon practically waves the cash in her face while flirting with her. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why she was able to absolve herself of any guilt - she was stealing from a rich, creepy guy. This would be a form of rationalization.

While driving to see her boyfriend, she grows tired and pulls over to the side of the road and falls asleep. She is awakened by a police officer who suspects that the woman might be in some sort of trouble. Crane's hurried manner and defensive attitude only increase the officer's suspicions. The officer is an example of Freud's theory of ego. He is very cool, emotionless, and almost mechanical in his demeanor. No doubt a logical thinker who relies on police intuition and paying close attention to the environment and noticing subtle cues about Cranes behavior. This contrasts with Crane, who represents the id - basing her decisions on emotions such as desire, greed, lust and love. She is unaware of how her defensiveness makes her look more guilty.

The police officer eventually lets Marion go. Eventually, she grows tired and decides to stay at a motel. The motel is run by Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) who turns out to be a serial killer. Bates is a deeply disturbed young man who has a strong Oedipus complex in regards to his mother. It is so strong, in fact, that he had murdered his mother in a jealous rage after he found out that she had found a male lover. Unable to mentally handle the loss of his mother and his own guilt, he keeps her corpse, dresses it, and cares for it by using his taxidermy skills. His mind fragments and splits into two personalities. He adopts the persona and dress of his mother.

While dressed as his mother, he murders Crane while she is taking a shower in one of the Bates' motel cabins in one of the most talked about scenes in cinematic history. (House of Horrors, para 4). Prior to the murder, the audience's attention is drawn to the money, safely wrapped in a newspaper on the nightstand. Hitchock allows the audience to bask in the guilty pleasure of sharing in the sense of comfort that Crane may have felt believing that the money was all hers. The second guilty pleasure, one that Hitchcock was probably teasing the audience with since the beginning of the movie, was seeing Crane naked, basking in the warmth and sanctity of the restroom - painted white as if to offset the uncleanly business that goes on in restrooms. The comfort of the phallic, anal and genital stages of Freudian theory contribute to the sanctity of the setting, as a bathroom is a safe haven for these Freudian stages to manifest. Crane, as well as the audience, pays for their enjoyment of the shower as the curtains are ripped open and she is stabbed to death. This is accompanied by a piercing, terrifying score. (House of Horrors, para 3)

Bates had taken a liking to Crane after having dinner with her the night before. However, his alter ego of his mother is not happy about the prospect of an attractive young woman disrupting the love affair between mother and son. He even holds conversations with himself thinking he's speaking to his mother.

Therefore Bates, dressed as his mother, represents the jealous side of the mother persona - she needed to eliminate the threat posed by an attractive young woman who could steal her son away. The mother side of Bates' mind could represent the superego - the domineering personality of a mother whose son is beholden to her. At the same time, there is an element of id in the mother persona if you are to assume that she killed Crane out of jealousy towards a young attractive woman who might steal her son. Bates ends up trapped in ambivalence, taking a liking to the girl with the mother side hating her for being a threat to their relationship. It serves to negate guilt over the murder. (Berger, Arthur. P. 90)

Following the murder, Norman Bates returns to the crime scene as the innocent son who cleans up the evidence simply because he is being a dutiful son doing what he has to do to protect his mother. This serves two psychological purposes for Bates fragmented persona - alleviating the big green eyed monster of his jealousy towards his mother and her lover by making his mother the jealous one, and absolving himself of guilt related to the murder at the same time. This love hate relationship is another example of ambivalence - hatred for the murder, but covering up the scene of the crime out of love, as well as projecting the jealousy to his mother to alleviate his own.

Ironically, as reality starts to catch up to Norman Bates and his demented game, a private investigator, as well as Crane's family assumes that Bates was involved in Crane's disappearance to get to her cash.

Money had nothing to do with Norman Bates' motivation. In fact, Bates didn't seem to have any use for money whatsoever. Hardly anyone ever stayed at his motel.

Crane, on the other hand, could have avoided her death if she would have just deposited the money in the bank in the first place. In this case the use of money in this film is a conventional symbol. The money signifies the root of all evil and paying the ultimate price for succumbing to its power.

As for Bates, a perverted form of justice seemed to crystallize in his twisted mind. As he sat in a holding cell at the end of the movie the persona of the mother had taken over, consigned to the fact that her son would go away for murder for a crime that she had committed. This is an example of Bates' psychological defense mechanism of reaction formation, to escape having to accept the reality of being caught and going away for life. (Berger, Arthur. P.90)

The conclusions about critical differences are that women can have a great deal of power over men. According to Anderson, men seem to hold the cards professionally and financially, as evidenced by the oil tycoon and the male employers at the real estate office while women hold low wage jobs with a lot of stress (P. 81). However, the power of an attractive young woman can cause a man, who prides himself on being able to control his emotions, to do things he normally wouldn't do. This played a part with the oil tycoon giving Crane the cash - he wanted to flash money at her in an attempt to eventually gain sexual favors. Normally, he probably wouldn't be so irresponsible with his money. Also, the power of sexual attraction came into play with Crane at the hotel. Bates attraction towards her caused his alter ego to snap with jealousy stemming from the power of sexual attraction. Also, Hitchcock used her attractiveness to entice the viewers into an erotic scene and then make them pay for their sin by enduring the stabbing scene. Beautiful women have enormous power, more power than a man - no matter how rich or attractive he may be. More so than money, sexual attraction towards women was the main signifier in the movie and served as the root cause of the main character's dissent into complete and utter madness.