Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #10056 in DVD
• Released on: 2005-10-17
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Formats: Black & White, PAL, Special Edition
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 2
• Running time: 104 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
For all the slasher pictures that have ripped off Psycho (and particularly its classic set piece, the "shower scene"), nothing has ever matched the impact of the real thing. More than just a first-rate shocker full of thrills and suspense, Psycho is also an engrossing character study in which director Alfred Hitchcock skillfully seduces you into identifying with the main characters--then pulls the rug (or the bathmat) out from under you. Anthony Perkins is unforgettable as Norman Bates, the mama's boy proprietor of the Bates Motel; and so is Janet Leigh as Marion Crane, who makes an impulsive decision and becomes a fugitive from the law, hiding out at Norman's roadside inn for one fateful night. Psycho gets the masterpiece treatment it deserves on DVD. --Jim Emerson

Synopsis
Credited with inventing the genre of the modern horror film, Psycho has had its share of sequels and imitators, none of which diminishes the achievement of this shocking and complex horror thriller. Alfred Hitchcock's choreography of elements in Psycho is considered so perfect it inspired a shot-by-shot remake by Gus Van Zant in 1998. However, Hitchcock's black-and-white original, featuring Anthony Perkins's haunting characterisation of lonely motel keeper Norman Bates, has never been equalled. Bates presides over an out-of-the-way motel under the domineering spectre of his mother. The young, well-intentioned Bates is introduced to the audience when Marion Crane (Janet Leigh), a blonde on the run with stolen money, checks in for the night. But Momma doesn't like loose women, so the stage is set for this classic tale of horror and one of the most famous scenes in film history. Psycho was initially received by audiences with shock and amazement and it still terrifies today. Though it is now considered prototypical Hitchcock, its setting, pace, and emphasis on terror was a major departure for the director at the time, coming after the more classically grand North by Northwest.

Customer Reviews

Special edition? More like a joke edition!
To call this 2 disc set a 'special edition' is to insult all those film lovers who revere this film as one of the greatest movies ever made. The first disc contains a poor quality, worn print of the feature presented in an unfamiliar format and an even poorer quality trailer. The second disc contains extracts only from Hitchcocks American Film Institute Life Acheivment Award ceremony and a couple of short interviews. The 2nd disc runs all of 49 minutes! It's shocking that this appears to be the best that Universal can give us as a 'special edition'. What a joke!

we're all caught in our private traps...
"We're all caught in our private traps, we scratch and claw at the air, at each other, but for all of it, we never budge an inch".

Yes, "Psycho" is missing the vibrancy of "North by Northwest", vividity of "Vertigo", ambiguity of "The Birds", and claustrophobia of "Rear Window", but it is a unique movie in its very own league. With Hitchcock's sharp eye with little details, genius camera angles, and keen sense of generating suspense and tension, "Psycho" is multi-layered and richly-textured film, Master's last great picture.

The film starts out very slowly. During the first hour, Hitchcock focuses on a single specific event and takes the viewer somewhat familiar point mostly seen in classic film noirs: a confused woman, being stuck in an impasse with a lover bogged down in financial woes, steals money off her employer. Things becomes to go awry en route California (where her lover lives), while she encounters some "MacGuffins" such as a mysterious patrolman and suspicious used-car salesman, both are the harbingers of incipient tension and terror. Her edgy trip ends in a sleazy motel off the main highway in a rainy night. Hitchcock startles the viewer while central female antagonist dies half-way through the film, and takes us another sinister place where the real secret is revealed. From this point, Anthony Perkins lead the show as twitchy motel keeper with peculiar idiosyncrasies. This is the role of his life, as everybody is waiting horrified whenever this schizoid time bomb will go off.

From the very beginning, Hitchcock imbues the film with a heavy atmosphere of impending doom. Blood-chilling strings of composer Bernard Herrmann adds greatly to the overall moodiness. Today's horror/thrillers depend too much on graphic violence, where blood, gore, decapitations, and dismembered bodies galore. Not overly violent and with almost no blood and gore, the unshakable effectiveness "Psycho" mutters up comes from what is implied, but not shown. He always used to make the audience use their imagination. This is the greatness of Hitchcock.

Now for the downside, I found the second half of the film somewhat forced. Private eye Arbogast's insatiable obsession with Norman and his ill mother is totally unconvincing. Lila's (Marion's sister) intuition about something bad had happened in the motel is groundless. Sam and Lila's visit to the motel and their sureness about Marion's stay in room number 1 is totally implausible. Also, the secret of the film is predictable half-way through, as soon as all the pieces are put in proper places. But, neither of these weak points undermine the cleverness and effectiveness of this great piece of cinema. "Psycho" is definitely a classic and deserves to be called so.

Hitchcock at his best
What is so captivating about this movie is the central performance of Janet Leigh. The psychology of her character, who suddenly decides to steal a large amount of money, is fascinating. So much so that Hitchcock spends half the movie with the camera focused on her face as she drives through rain.

I suppose it's a psychological study in senseless action, from life-ruining theft to murder. We're all tempted to do such mad things, and that's what Hitchcock is exploring.