|
A Master's Stroke
America checks out at the Bates Motel.
by Sonny Bunch
10/24/2009 12:01:00 AM, Volume 015, Issue 07
The Moment of Psycho
How Alfred Hitchcock Taught America to Love Murder
by David Thomson
Basic, 192 pp., $22.95
It's Summer 1960--June, to be exact--and you â re looking to escape the heat beating down on the city streets: Why not retire to the local cinema and take in a movie under the refrigerated air conditioning? And look! the new Hitchcock movie is just about to start. Good timing on your part since the portly Englishman has decreed no one shall enter a screening once the movie has begun.
We â re dealing with pretty standard fare--slightly risqu , perhaps, with Janet Leigh â s Marion Crane shown in her bra a couple of times, but nothing too special. She â s engaged in a major theft from her employer, skipping Phoenix with the illicit proceeds and looking for a place to hole up on the way to Fairvale, California.
Ah, look! she â s pulling into a motel for the night, just as that intimidating police officer suggested she do. And here â s the hotelkeeper, a slight little thing with a jaunty gait and an awkward way of speaking. He â s shy, a mama â s boy who endures the old woman â s shrill taunts, becoming aggravated when they â re noticed by the attractive young woman who ...
|
