The Paradox of Desire in Hitchcock’s "Psycho"

Photo credit: Downtown Greensboro, Inc. 

Psycho begins with a suspenseful, anxiety-inducing music score: the volume and tempo amplifies as the credits roll in. The establishing shot pans over Phoenix, Arizona, and then the camera makes its way through a barely-opened hotel room window, immediately establishing the audience as voyeurs. We see Marion Crane, the female protagonist who is infamously killed off forty-seven minutes into the film, lying in bed shirtless, wearing white underwear, looking up at her divorced love interest, Sam. Already, we know this film is going to be unlike anything Hitchcock’s directed before. The abolishment of The Hays Code, which hindered creativity and “indecency” in film for the first half of the twentieth century, allowed Hitchcock to exploit previously forbidden tactics: a man and woman lying in bed, half-naked, passionately exchanging kisses for more than three seconds at a time, and later in the film, a zoomed-in shot of a toilet flushing.

Within the first four minutes of the film, we are introduced to Marion’s desires. She wants to be able to meet Sam in public instead of in hotel rooms, she wants to cook him a dinner at home with her sister, and most importantly, she wants to marry him. Marion desires a life of domesticity―how very “a woman belongs at home” of Hitchcock―but Sam is unable to give her what she wants because he simply cannot afford it. He refutes her proposal by saying he is still paying his father’s debts and his ex-wife’s alimony, and he is not capable of giving Marion the life she deserves. So when Marion returns to work and is handed $40,000 to take to the bank for safe keeping, her desire to marry Sam propels her to steal the money. Her child-like naivety is nauseating: she thinks stealing this money will make Sam marry her, so she becomes a criminal for the sake of love. Granted the man she steals from, Tom Cassidy, is a sexist pig and can afford to lose the money, as he impudently gloats that he “never carries more than [he] can afford to lose,” one cannot help but pass judgement on Marion’s stupidity: she’s not even stealing the money for herself, she’s stealing it for Sam, who doesn’t know what he wants and probably won’t ever marry her.

Although the film attempts to critique patriarchal values through presenting characters like Tom Cassidy as repugnant and obnoxious, it is still profoundly misogynistic: the only female who possesses agency in the film is not only deceptive and a thief, but she is brutally slaughtered in what is perhaps the most eroticized murder in cinema history. On Marion’s drive to see Sam in California, it begins to rain heavily, and she is forced to pull into The Bates Motel, where she meets the charmingly awkward and sheepish Norman Bates, who invites her into his parlor for sandwiches and milk. She reluctantly agrees and enters the room, where she is met with stuffed birds displayed like prizes on a wall. You can see the horror on her face, and our anxieties are amplified when Norman remarks that she “eat(s) like a bird” (35:35). This comment makes the viewer uneasy because we know Marion’s last name is “Crane,” and we also know that Norman has a weird fascination with dead birds. Hitchcock plays with language to heighten both our and Marion’s anxieties in this scene, as these minute, yet thoughtful details, hint at the notion that this encounter will end badly for Marion.

When Marion gets in the showers, she has an orgasmic response to the cleansing effects of the water on her skin (47:05). The camera zooms into her wide-smiling sensual face, and then to the showerhead expelling water, and then back to Marion’s lips, which are parted into an “o.” As the burden of guilt washes down the drain with her natural dirt, we are again situated as voyeurs: we are terribly fascinated with watching Marion take a shower, just as Bates is with watching her get undressed. We judge Norman for being creepy, yet Hitchcock reverses this judgement by suggesting that we are no different from Norman. As Marion continues to experience ecstasy in the shower, we see a shadow creep into the bathroom, and Marion lets out a high-pitched squeal. The murder sequence is filmed in a series of shot reverse shots, showing the phallic knife repeatedly stabbing Marion’s naked, vulnerable body. Although we never see the knife touch her, we witness Marion’s reaction as she tries to dodge the psychopathic “Mother”: twisting her body away from the knife at least thirteen times, the camera making its way down her lower body and semi-covered breasts. She extends her arm onto the backsplash as she leans almost lifelessly against the wall, her hand sliding down the shower tile sensually, as if what she just experienced was an orgasm.

When comparing this murder to Arbogast’s, which happens shortly after, there is a clear dichotomy not only in where the characters were murdered, but also in the execution of their deaths: the woman dies naked, while in the shower, and the man is fully clothed, and not a hint of eroticism is expelled as he plummets to his death after being stabbed. Portraying a woman’s murder as seductive is not only disturbing, but it also suggests that satisfying the male gaze is more important than creating sympathy or even maintaining authenticity: I don’t know about you, but if I were being stabbed to death, it would be the furthest thing from sexy.

Photo Credit: BAFTA Guru

Psycho adheres to its genre― psychological thriller― by not only emphasizing elements of drama and mystery, especially seen through Hitchcock’s genius use of shadow and scale and the gothic elements embedded throughout the film, but also by highlighting the mental instability of both Marion and Bates’ characters. Marion goes through great lengths and even gets herself killed because she fervently believes stealing money will be the answer to marriage, and even more delusional than her, Norman’s mind literally houses two people. He is part Norman and part Mother and at times, he is fully mother. Norman’s ability to be two persons at the same time plays to the psychological aspect of its genre. Even though “Mother” isn’t revealed to be Norman until the very end, the film engages in the dichotomy between absence and presence, suggesting that one does not need to see Mother to know that she’s there. By cleverly shielding Mother’s face with shadows until the big reveal, Hitchcock neglects us of our desires to see Mother for the majority of the film. By doing so, Hitchcock poses the questions, “Do we even know what we desire, and to what lengths will we go to achieve these desires?” The film’s clever-factor thus lies in Norman’s ability to compartmentalize his multiple personalities, although the final scene challenges this very ability, as “Mother” seems to have fully possessed Norman’s mind.

Although the film has its issues with the representation of women and the eroticism prevalent in the female protagonist’s death, Psycho is innovative in that it dares to kill off its female lead half way through the film, it boldly depicts a serial killer as endearing and relatable, and it focuses the majority of the film on a character that only exists in Norman Bates’ mind.