Wait- there’s new footage in Alfred Hitchcock’s influential shocker- Psycho?
As it turns out when Psycho came out in 1960 these few seconds were in the film. It’s only when the film was later re-issued in theaters and eventually released on home video that they were missing. Some say it was the Legion of Decency who requested snipping certain scenes to not offend their Catholic audience (and at the time that agency had some clout in America). That version is the one most of us have seen ever since. What’s interesting is that in Germany, Psycho always played uncut, so when Universal was putting together the 60th Anniversary edition of the Blu-ray, they included the missing seconds of film.
Now Psycho is a movie I have practically memorized, like the books people chose to memorize in Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. Alfred Hitchcock bought the rights to Robert Bloch’s fictional chiller about murders at a remote motel on the highway. Slightly based on Wisconsin killer Ed Gein, Hitchcock decided to make it on the cheap, using his TV series crew. He even chose to bankroll the film himself (which reaped much monetary reward when the movie exploded at the box office). The film has influenced countless filmmakers and still continues to terrify and amuse viewers with its chilly, dark humor and startling moments of violence.
Now here’s what was cut (and is now restored):
The scene where Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins, whose performance gets more brilliant every time I watch it) pulls the picture off the wall and watches through a spyhole at motel visitor Marion Crane (Janet Leigh, who also dazzles). Marion is just about to shower and unhitches her bra, giving a brief flash of her breast. That just adds to the discomfort of the scene- further causing the audience to participate in voyeuristic peeping at her disrobing. That fleeting nudity also increases her vulnerability and the horror of what is to come.
The next addition occurs when Norman discovers Marion’s body and attempts to clean up and hide the body to protect “mother.” There is a lingering shot of the blood in his hands, so when he washes it off in the sink there is something truly ghastly about all of it.
Finally, the death of private investigator Milton Arbogast (Martin Balsam). When he climbs the stairs of the Bates house and the camera tracks him being attacked by “mother” and seemingly flying backwards down the stairs. The camera reveals him on his back at the bottom of the stairs as an old woman with a butcher knife leaps on him with an upraised knife. In the version we know, the knife rises and comes down once and the scene is over. Now the knife rises and falls several times, brutally stabbing him until there is a gargled scream from Arbogast, which is surprisingly shocking.
Do these few seconds matter? I definitely think so. They just add more horror and voyeuristic creepiness to Hitchcock’s terror masterpiece. And who cares? It’s more of Psycho. After 60 years, how cool is that?
This is fantastic news!
This just made my day! This just made my wife’s day! Thanks for the tip off!