thrillers of inspiration - pscho

Psycho 

 Psycho is a 1960 American horror-thriller film directed by Alfred Hitchcock starring Anthony Perkins, Vera Miles, John Gavin, and Janet Leigh. The film centers on the encounter between a secretary, Marion Crane (Leigh), who ends up at a secluded motel after embezzling money from her employer, and the motel's disturbed owner-manager, Norman Bates (Perkins), and its aftermath. When originally made, the film was seen as a departure from Hitchcock's previous film North by Northwest, having been filmed on a low budget, with a television crew and in black and white. Psycho initially received mixed reviews, but outstanding box office returns prompted reconsideration which led to overwhelming critical acclaim and four Academy Award nominations, including Best Supporting Actress for Leigh and Best Director for Hitchcock. It is now considered one of Hitchcock's best films and praised as a work of cinematic art by international film critics and film scholars. Ranked among the greatest films of all time, it set a new level of acceptability for violence, deviant behaviour and sexuality in American films. Alfred Hitchcock's powerful, complex psychological thriller, Psycho (1960) is the "mother" of all modern horror suspense films - it single-handedly ushered in an era of inferior screen 'slashers' with blood-letting and graphic, shocking killings. While this was Hitchcock's first real horror film, he was mistakenly labeled as a horror film director ever since.

This thriller has made it into my inspiration post due it having elements and quality's within it that i want to replicate and take forward and adapt in my thriller opener, these are things like not actually showing anyone being killed in this film which to me is exciting as it allows the viewer to create there own idea of what happens when someone is killed in the film as it adds another dimension of anticipation which you never get to find out and i feel this would be an efective atmosphere to create. Another reason i really love this thriller is the how Hitchcock (the director) made no secret of his methods of using the camera to tell a story and affect the emotions of his audience:‘The point is to draw the audience right inside the situation instead of leaving them to watch it from outside, from a distance. And you can do this only by breaking the action into details and cutting from one to the other, so that each detail is forced in turn on the attention of the audience and reveals its psychological meaning.’ Hitchcock, 1937. This to me is what i want to be able to show and thats why i feel this film really gives a good base to look at when thinking into my thriller opening.Also just generally looking at this film it give me really good conventional thriller elements this being the setting in a motel thats fairly remote this showimng there being nowhere for the victim to run to get help.Also The nightmarish, disturbing film's themes of corruptibility, confused identities, voyeurism, human vulnerabilities and victimisation, the deadly effects of money, Oedipal murder, and dark past histories are realistically revealed. Its themes were revealed through repeated uses of motifs, such as birds, eyes, hands, and mirrors all seem really useful elements to use in my opening due to them being all really simple and everyday objects to film.

                                              Here's the trailer to the film