Psycho (1960)
Psycho is a 1960 horror movie directed by Alfred Hitchcock, with a running time of 1h 49m. It stars Anthony Perkins, Janet Leigh and Vera Miles.
A secretary steals forty thousand dollars from her boss and drives out of the city, exhausted and guilty, until rain forces her off the road at a lonely motel. The clerk, Norman Bates, is boyish and polite, devoted to the sick mother who watches from the house on the hill. Alfred Hitchcock built his 1960 shocker to upend every expectation an audience carries in, shooting in stark black and white with Bernard Herrmann's shrieking strings. Anthony Perkins makes Norman gentle and unnerving at once. The film reset what horror could do and where a story could turn.
Quick answers
What is Psycho about?
A secretary steals forty thousand dollars from her boss and drives out of the city, exhausted and guilty, until rain forces her off the road at a lonely motel. The clerk, Norman Bates, is boyish and polite, devoted to the sick mother who watches from the house on the hill. Alfred Hitchcock built his 1960 shocker to upend every expectation an audience carries in, shooting in stark black and white with Bernard Herrmann's shrieking strings. Anthony Perkins makes Norman gentle and unnerving at once. The film reset what horror could do and where a story could turn.
When was Psycho released?
Psycho was released on 22 June 1960.
How long is Psycho?
Psycho runs 1h 49m.
Who made Psycho?
Psycho was directed by Alfred Hitchcock.
Where can I watch Psycho?
Psycho is available on Amazon Video, Apple TV Store, Fandango At Home, Google Play Movies and YouTube.
Where to watch Psycho
Rent: Amazon Video, Apple TV Store, Fandango At Home, Google Play Movies, YouTube
Buy: Amazon Video, Apple TV Store, Fandango At Home, Google Play Movies, YouTube
Cast
- Anthony Perkins as Norman Bates
- Janet Leigh as Marion Crane
- Vera Miles as Lila Crane
- John Gavin as Sam Loomis
- Martin Balsam as Milton Arbogast
- John McIntire as Al Chambers
- Simon Oakland as Fred Richman
- Frank Albertson as Tom Cassidy
- Patricia Hitchcock as Caroline
- Vaughn Taylor as George Lowery
- Lurene Tuttle as Mrs. Chambers
- John Anderson as California Charlie
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A few thoughts on Psycho
Junji Ito's comic Uzumaki channels the same creeping dread in an isolated place where something is deeply wrong. The game Batman: Arkham Asylum turns a house of disturbed minds into an atmosphere of unease Norman would recognize. Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska haunts the quiet edges of America with the same still, murderous calm.
Slashers built on a single terrifying killer
Psycho reset horror around Norman Bates and that shower, seeding the slasher genre that followed. These pick up the thread with lone maniacs stalking motels, funhouses and sleepover nights, trading Hitchcock's restraint for sharper knives while keeping his lesson that the quiet, polite ones are the ones to fear.
Psychological horror where the mind is the monster
Anthony Perkins makes Norman gentle and unnerving at once, a man split against himself, and these live in that same fractured headspace. Unreliable memories, doubled identities and unraveling sanity drive the scares, across twisty thrillers and spiraling manga where the real threat is what a broken mind will do next.
Twisted family secrets and the houses that hide them
Norman's devotion to the mother in the house on the hill gives Psycho its rot, and these share that sense of a home built on horror. Sinister children, decaying mansions and cursed inheritances hide their secrets behind closed doors, in film, comics and fiction where family is the scariest thing under the roof.
Quietly unnerving psychological-thriller manga
Psycho works by making the ordinary sinister, and these manga chase the same slow-building unease. Death games, obsessive killers and creeping body horror unfold in tight, methodical panels, rewarding readers who want the dread Hitchcock perfected translated into ink and paper that refuses to let you look away.