Mason’s First Horror Movie: Psycho

Mason’s been hinting around about wanting to watch a horror movie for some time now. To put things in perspective, Mason’s ten-years-old and in fifth grade. I was in sixth grade when I first saw Nightmare on Elm Street over at Jason Lee’s house, and Children of the Corn that same year over at Andy Green’s. To date, I think the scariest thing Mason has seen on television is either Something Wicked This Way Comes or the original Dracula. The last time he brought up watching a scary movie, we made it ten minutes into The Ring before he declared “I’M OUT!” and leaving the room.

So, disclaimer here — up until last night, I had never seen Psycho before; that is, I had never sat down and watched the film from beginning to end. I had of course seen “the shower scene” a thousand times on “best of” clip shows and knew the “twist” ending (hardly a twist, 50+ years later). But yeah, I had never seen the movie proper from beginning to end, so with Halloween just around the corner, I decided to take Mason on a visit to the Bates Hotel.

Unlike modern horror movies (or modern movies in general, really) it takes a while for Psycho to get going. Knowing what I knew about the movie, I was surprised at how long it took Marion Crane to meet Norman Bates. Prior to last night I knew nothing of the actual plot (the money, the affair, the disappearance, and so on). I really thought the movie was about Norman Bates killing people. Like I said, I knew about the murder in the shower, but I didn’t realize it was THE murder. Other than Crane’s murder, the only other murder that takes place is the killing of Private Investigator Milton Arbogast. I suppose in 1960, having not one but two on-screen murders was a big deal. In 2012, I think most horror movies have two on-screen murders before the opening credits roll.

I also read on IMDB that when the film was originally released, Psycho was the first motion picture to feature the flushing of a toilet. It’s unbelievable to me that 50 years ago this was considered groundbreaking or even notable. To put it in perspective, 52 years later, I watched part of the movie wirelessly on my iPad while sitting on a toilet.

I thought the end of the movie (not the arrest of Norman Bates, but the 15-minute exposition in which the police detectives explain the entire movie to the audience) felt old fashioned and tacked on. Audiences today are more sophisticated, in part due to films like Psycho. I have not seen the 1998 remake of the film (and can’t imagine what more it would bring to the plate), but especially to today’s audiences, I would think such a speech would seem borderline insulting. I would have rather seen the police interview and heard the story directly from Bates’ mouth.

As the movie ended, with the lights still out, Mason’s review of the film (and I’m quoting him directly here) was “Meh. Not scary.” He actually said “meh”. Without a second thought he said goodnight and went upstairs and went to bed. (He has the only bedroom on the second floor of the house.)

I, on the other hand, checked both the closet and all the door locks. Twice.