Psycho

4.64
    Psycho
    1960

    Synopsis

    When larcenous real estate clerk Marion Crane goes on the lam with a wad of cash and hopes of starting a new life, she ends up at the notorious Bates Motel, where manager Norman Bates cares for his housebound mother.

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    Cast

    • Anthony PerkinsNorman Bates
    • Janet LeighMarion Crane
    • Vera MilesLila Crane
    • John GavinSam Loomis
    • Martin BalsamPrivate Det. Milton Arbogast
    • John McIntireSheriff Al Chambers
    • Simon OaklandDr. Fred Richman
    • Frank AlbertsonTom Cassidy
    • Patricia HitchcockCaroline
    • Vaughn TaylorGeorge Lowery

    Recommendations

    • 100

      Chicago Sun-Times

      What makes Psycho immortal, when so many films are already half-forgotten as we leave the theater, is that it connects directly with our fears: Our fears that we might impulsively commit a crime, our fears of the police, our fears of becoming the victim of a madman, and of course our fears of disappointing our mothers.
    • 100

      The Telegraph

      Hitchcock's mischievous genius for audience manipulation is everywhere: in the noirish angularity of the cinematography, in his use of Bernard Herrmann's stabbing string score, in the ornithological imagery that creates a bizarre sense of preying and being preyed upon.
    • 100

      Slant Magazine

      Felt in the full impact of a theatrical screening (with the pleasure of seeing patrons reflexively kick or stiffen at the sight of Miles startled by her mirrored reflection), its power is not just that of a showman’s calibrated scare machine, but of a somber fugue on the trapped 20th-century creatures who inhabit its world, clawing but never budging an inch.
    • 100

      Empire

      Timeless classic. Superb performances and the infamous shower scene make this the perfect nightmare.
    • 100

      The New Yorker

      Psycho, in its dark and sordid extravagance, remains utterly contemporary, in its subject as well as in its production.
    • 100

      New York Daily News

      The obvious thing to say is that Hitch has done it again; that the suspense of his picture builds up slowly but surely to an almost unbearable pitch of excitement. Psycho is a murder mystery. It isn’t Hitchcock’s usual terrifier, a shocker of the nervous system; it’s a mind-teaser.
    • 90

      Variety

      Perkins gives a remarkably effective in-a-dream kind of performance as the possessed young man. Others play it straight, with equal competence.
    • 88

      ReelViews

      Psycho is a brilliant excursion into fear that pushes many of our primal buttons, but it lacks the story and character complexity of Vertigo and Rear Window.

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