Analysing 'Psycho'

In this essay, I will be analysing the film Psycho by Alfred Hitchcock, and in particular the shower scene, which sees the main character get stabbed and killed whilst having a shower. 

This scene uses predominantly mid – close up shots of characters and props, which allows the audience to see the reaction and the fear of the woman being stabbed. In addition, reasonable amounts of extreme closure up shots are used, which enables makes the audience feel scared. 

The scene is shot from three perspectives, from the victim, the killer and from a 3^rd person position, which allows an overview of the situation to be seen. 

Mainly eye-level shots are used to engage the audience, and when used from the victim and the killer’s perspective, the enables the audience to feel as though they are in the position of that character.

Shots often use tight framing, and the quick jump-cuts give a sense of chaos, and make the audience feel as though something is not normal. 

Often in the scene, shots show the shower or the flowing water. These shots are point of view shots from the perspective of the victim, and indicate that she is distracted from what is about to happen, and that she is completely unaware that her life will come to an end very soon. 

In the scene, jump cuts and straight cuts are mainly used, and these shots are edited together quite fast. This gives a sense of fast paced action, and makes the audience feel as though the characters are in danger and that the situation is out of control. In addition, when the victim walks from her bedroom to the bathroom, continuity editing techniques are used to clearly show the audience that she is walking from one place to another. Just as the stabbing has begun, a cut-away shot is used, showing dark cloud, thunder and rain outside. This is an image stereotypically associated with danger, which would continue to build tension with the audience. 

At the beginning of the scene, the cuts happen quite slowly, but the pace of cuts builds during the stabbing scene, again, giving a sense of chaos. The cuts then slow down after the death, which gives the impression that the victim is helpless and cannot be saved. 

Mise-en-scene is used in the scene to indicate to the audience where the scene is set. For example, when the woman is in a shower, the mid shots allow the audience to see a shower curtain and white tiles on the wall, which tells the audience that the scene is set in a bathroom. In addition, the victim’s finger and toe nails have been painted red – this perhaps indicates to the audience that something bad is going to happen, as red suggests death and danger. 

Furthermore, smoke effect is added, designed to simulate steam, which suggests to the audience that the shower is hot. This also would add to the confusion when the attack is taking place, and aids to disguise the attackers face, adding to the mystery of the scene. 

Fairly low lighting is used in the scene – this creates the impression that the bathroom and bedroom usually a fairly calm and controlled environment. It also serves to indicate to the audience that it is the evening.  

In the film, a lot of diegetic sound is used. For example, when the victim flushes her work away down the toilet, we can hear the sound of the water flow from the toilet, and also a bang is heard when the toilet seat is put down. Then, when the victim pulls the shower curtain, we can hear the curtain pulling along on the curtain rail. These sounds mean that the audience feel more involved with the action on screen, and can relate to the scene directly. From that point onwards, the sound of the running water from the shower can be heard. This sound would distract the victim from the presence of someone else in the shower, which would make the audience feel that the victim is quite vulnerable. 

Non-diegetic sound is also used in the scene. Once the victim sees her attacker, high-pitched, fast-paced discordant violin music starts, and then once the victim has actually been killed, the music changes to a minor scale, and is slower, which indicates to the audience that the situation has got worse.

 This first shot is of the shower head. It is a low angle shot, looking upwards at the shower, and the use of a mid-angle shot means that any background of the ceiling, or of other parts of the shower, is cut off. The main focus of the shot, the shower, is directly in the centre of the frame, and there is a small cross in the middle of the shower, which draws the audience’s attention directly to this point. The shot has been edited so that the flow of water goes around the camera and not on it. In addition, the fact that this shot is a Point of View shot from the victim’s perspective would make the audience understand that the victim is completely unaware of any impending danger. It is ironic that the flowing of water indicates cleansing, as in fact the victim will be killed in a few moments.  

A straight cut then moves to the next shot, which pans left from the woman having a shower, to the shower curtain, where we can just see the outline of the attacker. The eye-level shot used here puts the audience in the position of the victim, and as the camera tracks, the shot goes from a close up to a mid-shot. The style of the shower curtain, with it being slightly translucent, means that the audience has a distorted view of what is on the other side, which makes the audience intrigued as to who is there, and what the intentions of that person are.  

Once the shot has panned, the shot is framed tight on the curtain, which means that the audience’s attention is drawn to trying to work out what is on the other side. In addition, the scene is quite dimly lit, adding an element of mystery.

After the curtain opens, the scene reveals the attacker with a knife. The eye-level shot puts is taken from the position of the attacker, and the water from the shower, together with the lighting from the top left of the shot, means that the identity of the attacker is not clear to the audience. This shot uses the rule of thirds, as the important elements of the attacker – the knife and their face, are both in the centre of the shot. This shot would make the audience quite scared, as it could make them feel as though the knife is going to stab them. A jump cut is then used to move to the next shot, a close up of the knife.

This shot, which continues to be a point of view shot from the victim, shows very clearly an extreme close up of the knife that the attacker is holding. The use of a low angle shot makes the knife seem very powerful, and also makes the audience seem very weak and inferior. 

The use of depth of field, with the background being out of focus and the knife being in focus, means that the full attention of the audience is drawn towards the knife. In addition, we can still see some of the attacker’s hair, which reminds the audience who is holding the knife.

The next shot, shown on the left, again shows a point of view shot, but from the attacker’s perspective. The shot is an extreme close up of the victim’s mouth, and is showing the reaction of the victim. This, combined with the diegetic sound of a woman screaming, would make the audience feel extremely scared, as they can see the fear of the victim. Again, depth of field is used, which draws the attention of the audience straight to the woman’s mouth. In addition, the woman’s face is slightly off centre, which adds a sense of chaos and confusion to the shot.

The shot on the right shows the attacker’s knife stabbing the woman. The extreme close up shot is taken through the water coming from the shower, which means that it is not clear what exactly is happening. The bottom of the knife disappears off of the bottom of the hot, which again, adds to the sense of confusion. Furthermore, the actual stabbing occurs to the left of the shot, which allows us to see the vague outline of the attackers face in the background. Again, however, we cannot see the face of the attacker, which adds to the sense of mystery surrounding the attacker’s identity.

The scene then develops to a 3^rd person high angle shot. This allows the audience to see an overview of the situation, with the victim on the right being stabbed by the attacker on the left. This shot makes the victim seem completely defenceless, and although she is trying to defend herself by dragging the attackers hand away, the shot shows to the audience that there is no hope of escape. The framing of this shot means that no blood is shown, which indicates to the audience that the victim may not be dead yet. 

The next shot on the right shows from the attacker’s point of view, the blood running away from her body. The use of a mid-shot means that the audience can see lots of detail in this frame. The blood, coloured red which can symbolise danger, is in stark contrast to the parts of the bath that are white, a colour that usually indicates peace and safety. The high angle shot used also indicates that the victim is very helpless and defenceless. This shot has been framed to exclude any reference to the knife or to the attacker, perhaps allowing the audience to feel sad for the victim.

After the shot of the victim’s blood, a cut-away shot is used to show the sky, which looks grey and fierce, meaning that the audience associate it with a sense of impending doom for the characters involved in the main scene. Interestingly, the long shot has been framed to not show any land, which makes the audience wonder where abouts the scene is set, whether it is a city, or whether it is in a more rural location. Diegetic sounds of thunder and rain are then used, to make this image seem more imposing.

The next shot returns to the bathroom, and a point of view shot from the victim. The close up shot fills most of the frame, and makes it seem to the audience like the victim is trying desperately to escape, by grasping on to the tiles, where the audience know that she is in fact helpless. Like the previous shot in the bathroom, the red (which represents danger) of her nails is in contrast to the white of the floor, which indicates purity and safety.

The next shot, perhaps taken from the point of view of the attacker, is an extreme close up of the victim’s eye, which zooms inwards towards the pupil. This eye-level shot would make the audience feel extremely uncomfortable, if they were watching the film on the large screen of a cinema. The shot has been framed to show nothing but the eye, with no skin or other parts of the body.    It indicates to the audience that the victim is losing her battle to survive, and that she is now defenceless against her attacker.

The eye-level shot on the right then appears to show the attacker leaving the room. From this point onwards, now that the attack is complete, the editing appears to become slower. The use of a mid-shot means that we cannot see the identity of the killer very clearly, and the shot through water would perhaps indicate to the audience that the water is washing away any evidence of the killer, whilst the killer is leaving the hotel room. In contrast to one of the earlier shots, this shot has been framed to exclude the victim, which allows the audience to feel anger towards the attacker.  This shot then cuts to show the victim, reminding the audience that she is still in danger, and that the attacker has left behind destruction. 

The shot on the left then shows the victim desperately grabbing onto the shower curtain. The use of a close up shot allows us to only see the hand and the curtain, and not any other part of her body. In some ways, this shot reminds the audience of when the attacker came in, as we could only see a rough outline of the attacker through the curtain, and, like when the attacker was first introduced, a pan shot was used. This shot has been set up so that the fingers are in the centre of the shot, drawing our attention directly to the grabbing action. Also, the composition of the shot means that the area to the top right of the hand is blue – this creates an element of mystery, and makes the audience wonder what might be beyond the blue mist.

The scene then continues to show the victim’s blood being washed down the plug of the shower. This has been edited as a graphic match with the shot of the victim’s eye we saw earlier. The shot has been framed so that the plug hole fills the height of the shot, and inward spiral of the water draws the audience’s attention towards the blood that it in the plug. This shot symbolises the victim’s life and soul being washed away, and that the body is being cleansed, ready for a new life. If seen on a cinema screen, this could make some audience members frightened, and may make some people feel unwell. 

After the shot of the plughole, the shot on the left appears. The shot begins as an extreme close up, but is then edited to rotate as it zooms out, becoming a mid-shot. The shot is taken at eye, level, which would make the audience feel as though they are on the same level as the victim. Although the victim’s eye is looking to the right, the shot is framed so that the pupil of the eye is in the centre of the shot, drawing the attention of the audience to this point.

Continuity editing is then used to join the last shot to the one shown on the right. This shot shows a close up of the actors face, which is motionless, although we can still see water dripping from her hair and from her shoulders. Again, the actors eyes are looking right at the camera, which could make the audience feel very nervous and scared. At this point, reverb is applied to the diegetic sound, which makes the shower sound very distant. This indicates to the audience that the victim is now dead, and that she is no longer present in mind. Just under the actor’s neck, we can see what appears to be a pair of slippers. This reminds the audience that the victim had no idea the attack was about to take place, and that she had full intention for life to continue as normal afterwards.

After the shot of the victims face on the floor, the camera then tracks round, through the bathroom and the bedroom, to reveal a newspaper on the bedside table. This newspaper gives the audience a sense of location, as it appears to say ‘Los Angles’ on the map. The high angle of the shot means the shot is a Point of View from a 3^rd person, making the audience feel more involved with the scene. In addition, the shot uses the Golden Mean, because both the bedside lamp and the newspaper fall on this diagonal line across the shot.

After the previous shot, the camera tracks to the right, to look out of a window, creating the shot on the right. This type of scene is typically associated with the thriller genre, and the low angle of the shot makes the house and the vicious looking sky appear very imposing. At this point, the sound also changes, from the sound of the shower in the bathroom, to the sound of the bats and owls outside. This shot has been framed to still show a part of the window frame, which indicates that the shot is still inside the victim’s flat, and the red brick and yellow light coming from inside the house make the building look very intimidating. This shot, together with the other shots of the attacker, would indicate to the audience that this is not just simply a random attack on the victim.

 

In conclusion, I feel that the shower scene from ‘Psycho’ by Alfred Hitchcock displays well the different techniques that can be used when filming a dramatic scene in a thriller.

I feel that it is appropriate for the scene to have been set in a bathroom, as this is when people are at their most vulnerable, without any form of defence or protection against attack. In addition, bathrooms are places that are usually white, with white tiles, baths and floor, and as white is stereotypically associated with peace and safety, it is ironic that the blood can be seen clearly as something that breaks this. In addition, the presence of water has a big impact on this scene, as water is usually something that cleanses and is considered to be a pure substance. However, in this situation, water is used to wash away blood, which represents life.  

The shower scene from Psycho fits in well with the conventions of a modern thriller. The audience have no clue that the victim is about to be stabbed, which creates the element of surprise, which is present in most modern thrillers. Furthermore, all shots of the attacker do not clearly show his or her identity, which creates mystery, another feature common with thrillers. In addition, the scene uses lots of mid angle shots and close or extreme close ups, which, when edited together, make the action seen fast paced, making the audience feel scared.