Wir versuchen, eine gute Geschichte mit einer mitreißenden Handlung zu

erzählen. Während der Arbeit entwickeln sich die einzelnen Szenen.

Alfred Hitchcock zu Donald Spoto 1

¹ Spoto. p.14.

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1  T Ta ab bl le e o of f C Co on nt te en nt ts  1

1  TABLE OF CONTENTS  2

2  INTRODUCTION  3

3  CONSTELLATION OF CHARACTERS  4

3.1  INSIDE THE BOOK  4

3.2  READING THE FILM  6

3.2.1  MARY  6

3.2.2  THE RELATIONSHIP MARY-NORMAN  7

3.2.3  NORMAN  9

3.2.4  THE MATTER OF SAM AND LILA  10

3.2.5  ARBOGAST  11

4  THE STRUCTURE OF THE FILM AND ITS ELEMENTS.  12

4.1  PLOT POINTS ACCORDING TO SYD FIELD  12

4.2  ELEMENTS OF SUSPENSE  13

4.2.1  CLOSE-UP: THE SHOWER SCENE  15

5  CONCLUSION  17

6  APPENDIX  18

6.1  BIBLIOGRAPHY  18

6.1.1  PRIMARY TEXTS AND MATERIALS  18

6.1.2  SECONDARY TEXTS  18

6.1.3  OTHER MATERIALS  18

6.2  STORIES I-V  18

2 I Introduction 2

About fifty years ago a little town in Wisconsin, Plainfield, was shaken by discovering a fiftyone-year old mass murderer living among them. Ed Gein, who had not only killed, but also disassembled his victims, was to become the role model as an archetypical character in the American horror literature. About thirty-nine miles from Plainfield it was Robert Bloch, ² who became interested in Gein:

“I wondered how this man, never suspected of any kind of wrongdoing, in a

town where if someone sneezed on the north side of town, someone in the south

side said ‘Gesundheit,’ was only suddenly discovered to be a mass murderer. I

was also puzzled by how unanxious his neighbors were to speak about his crimes.

I said to my self: ‘There’s a story here.’” 3

It was Bloch’s curiosity about the dark side of Puritan America, about America’s psychology cult, especially about Freudian theories ⁴ and the ever strong worship of a mother picture that transformed Ed Gein into Norman Bates, a bogeyman with an Oedipus fixation on “mother,” into a transvestite with a love for taxidermy. According to Stephen Rebello ⁵ the book had an instant success in the United States. Of course the contemporary reader, “Stephen King-ed and Cliff Barker-ed to a bloody pulp,” ⁶ can hardly imagine the emotions of the audience in the late 50’s, with Agatha Christie mysteries as main stream literature:

“Robert Bloch had sexed-up and Freudianized the Gothic, revitalizing such

creaky elements as the rattletrap Old Dark House, the stormy night and the

crackpot madwoman locked in the dank basement. Into the brew, Bloch stirred a

motel on the skids and a randy, alcoholic, mama’s boy whose scrambled psyche

and way with taxidermy could keep several shrinks in summerhouses in the

Hamptons for years.” 7

At the time when Bloch wrote Psycho Hitchcock already had been a renowned film director, for whom “Paramount function[ed] practically as a studio setup for him.” ⁸ However,

² Rebello. p 7.

³ Rebello. p.8.

⁴ A perfect example for this interest are the writings by Henry Miller, e.g. Rosy Crucifixion and Tropic of Capricorn.

⁵ Rebello. p. 11f.

⁶ Rebello. p.12.

⁷ Rebello. p. 12.

⁸ Rebello. p. 16.

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this constant success had put Hitchcock on his guard against the “trap of self-plagiarism” ⁹ In search for the unexpected, Psycho was his chance to further develop his style of suspense by entering a new field of the Gothic horror. Hitchcock’s trust ¹⁰ in the story proved him right, because as the book seemed to be a winner, the film achieved a groundbreaking success until today. 11

Fleeing from the hopelessness of life and trying to achieve some “peaceful island” for herself and her lover, Mary ¹² Crane steals the money of her employee and becomes lost during a strong storm. She finally arrives at Bates motel, where Mary meets her destiny and the end of her life, while the dominance of the past over the present teaches the audience a dreadful and deadly lesson.

3 C Constellation o of C Characters 3

Dominance of past over present, sexual secrets and repression, a journey into nowhere or into darkness, salvation, shower murder as sexual act (as substitute for rape ¹³ ), the fruit cellar as clear symbol of (disturbed) sexuality, ¹⁴ architecture: there are a dozen references to the horror and the psychic conditions of man, especially in a movie that tries to deal with human passions and human guilt.

3.1 I Inside t the B Book 3

The film’s success should not be compared to the book. Although it served as a basic template for the script, it is a long way to the suspense, tension, and thrill of the film. Instead it comes along with boring clichés, cardboard figures, and actions that one would half expect. As an illustration for this could be the introduction of Mother, who appears as a real person in the first half of the book, a person one can talk and argue with.

⁹ Rebello. p.17.

¹⁰ Please refer to the sudden shower murder: end of part 3.1

^{11 Psycho was nominated the Oscar for best Actress, Best Direction, Best cinematography, best director. It has won the Edgar Allan Poe Award of 1961, the Golden Globe of 1961, and two Laurel Awards in 1961. Recorded with a budget of $800.000 it roughly made about $ 32million. (Internet Movie Data Base:} http://www.imdb.com 2002)

¹² The character’s name in the book is “Mary,” in the film she is called “Marion.” For simplicity I will use “Mary,” to describe both, the film’s and the book’s character.

¹³ Wood

¹⁴ Hitchcock, Psycho: “You think I am fruity…”. DVD.

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“Actually, he was aware of the footsteps without even hearing them; long

familiarity aided his senses, whenever Mother came into the room. He didn’t

even have to look up to know she was there. […] ‘Norman, do you know what

time it is?’ He sighed and closed the book. He could tell now that she was going

to be difficult; the very question was a challenge. Mother had to pass the

grandfather clock in the hall […]” 15

Hitchcock on the contrary lets Mother only appear as some sort of ghost, which does not seem to be real, but emerges in a shadowy appearance in a window. Also Norman - in the film he is a nice young man, who does not seem to be capable of committing murder - is such a cardboard figure, appearing rosy, pudgy, and already psychologically defect. This can be seen by the amounts of drinking and by the kinds of books he is reading. While Bloch claims taxidermy to be a the central part in the book ¹⁶ - taxidermy plays an important role in the filmit is rather treated short handedly by Bloch:

“Well, no just taxidermy. George Blount gave me that squirrel to stuff.” 17

The way Norman answers Mary’s question about how he uses his time looks almost as a casual remark, compared to the importance taxidermy receives in the film. Another part of the book that could serve as an example, how cheaply written the book appears, could be the flight of Marion, who barely seems to experience an emotional conflict. Although Bloch tried to setup her inner mind and her inner troubles, somehow his effort does not afflict the reader. She does recall the events and she does suffer, as one can read:

“Mary glanced into the rear-view mirror and caught a dim reflection of her face.

The dark hair and the regular features were still familiar, but the smile had gone

and her full lips were compressed to a taut line. Where had she seen that drawn,

contorted countenance before? In the mirror after mom died, when you went to

pieces------“ 18

However, the visualization does not seem to be as passionate as it is in the film, because the auctorial narrator loses his grip and intensity as he stays on the surface of the character and does not elaborate why Mary is feeling so intense. Furthermore, when he eventually enters

¹⁵ Bloch, Psycho: p 12. The underlined words show clearly, how Bloch works to indicate the Mother is really there.

¹⁶ Rebello, p. 9.

¹⁷ Bloch, Psycho: p. 42.

¹⁸ Bloch, Psycho: p. 32.

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