Psycho (1960) Image Analysis

In this scene in Psycho we see Marion
driving down a highway like road. It is raining very heavily in this scene
which connotes sadness and misery. This pathetic fallacy is enough to allow the
viewer to realise the depression, confusion and darkness of this scene. It is
also night time in this scene and low key lighting is used throughout which
also helps to enforce the idea of sadness and perhaps mystery. This all helps
add to the mise-en-scene of this part of the film. The cinematography that
Hitchcock uses throughout this scene creates an extremely powerful and
depressing atmosphere The close up on her face goes on for around a minute
allowing the audience a better view of Marion’s feelings. The montage of
thoughts that are being heard in her head throughout this scene add to the
eeriness and helps the audience identify with Marion’s confused thoughts.

This scene from Psycho is
when Norman Bates is staring at Marion through a small hole while she is
getting undressed to get into the shower. Laura Mulvey’s theory of the ‘Male
Gaze’ is relevant here, given how she analyses the way in which men stare at
women in a pleasurable way. The idea of voyeurism or scopophilia comes up here
very strongly. The close up allows us to see the way he is gazing through the
hole and then it changes to a point of view shot for the audience to see
exactly what he’s seeing. We then get a close up of his strange and perhaps
perverted reaction. The point of view shot also forces us to see through his
eyes, creating an unsettling feeling for the viewer as if we were voyeurs too.
Low key lighting is also used in the scene to help the audience to realise he
is hidden and dark, and therefore an evil and untrustworthy character. This
scene is also made up of reasonably slow editing unlike the shower scene which
is a quick montage of images which comes shortly after.

In this scene of Psycho we
see Norman Bates talking to Marion when they are sat down eating sandwiches.
Norman explains that Marion eats like a bird. Marion’s surname is Crane which
is a type of bird and also Norman enjoys stuffing birds as a hobby. This could
lead to us thinking that he see Marion as a bird and is going to kill her and
perhaps stuff her. Norman’s hobby probably goes against the CDI (Cultural
Dominant Ideology) as the idea of being a taxidermist seems slightly odd. Ed
Gein used to also cut up dead bodies, and make furniture and masks out of them.
The taxidermy thing is linking Norman to Gein, using the historical context to
maximise the impact of the film. The lighting in this scene is reasonably
bright allowing us to see that the scene is supposed to be a bit happier and
more pleasant. This helps the mystery aspect of the narrative as we don’t know
if Norman is thinking of her as just a guest which helps the final twist in the
narrative where he is surprisingly revealed to be the killer.