UNIVERSIDADE FEDERAL DO CEARÁ

DISCIPLINE: LITERATURA IV
TEACHER: LOLA
STUDENTS: PAULO E KELIANE
DUE ON: 06/02/2016
ARTICLE - PSYCHO: CHARACTERIZATION AND ACTING
OF NORMAN BATES

In this article an analysis of the characterization and the acting of

Norman Bates is proposed. First, a brief presentation of the novel and the
movie is made, and then we proceeded to the proposed analysis.

The Novel

Robert Bloch, a disciple of H.P. Lovecrafti, wrote Psycho in 1959. Bloch

got the main idea for the novel from the case of serial killer Ed Gein who was
arrested in 1957. Ed Gein has inspired many other books and films like: The
Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974) and The Silence of The Lambs (1991).
Despite the fact that Bloch did not became as famous as Hitchcock or even as
Psycho’s screenplay writer Joseph Stefano, all the shocking key elements of
the movie are originally in the book. One can say that the main differences are
the appearance of the characters, and how deep the reader gets to know them.

The Movie

Psycho was a low-budget 1960’s horror movie produced and directed by

the acclaimed English filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock. It was adapted for the
cinema from the homonymous 1959’s novel written by Robert Block. Despite
the budget constraint, Hitchcock managed to produce an outstanding piece of
art. The movie is in the list of greatest films of all time. Among the film themes
we can find corruptibility, confused identities, voyeurism, human vulnerabilities,
Oedipal murder, etc. Psycho set new parameters for the movie industry. It is
considered the Mother of all horror movies, some example are The Texas
Chainsaw Massacre (1974), Halloween (1978), Motel Hell (1980), and Dressed
to Kill (1980)

Movie Highlights

- The female protagonist having a lunchtime affair in her sexy white

undergarments in the first scene;
- The photograph of a toilet bowl - and flush - in a bathroom (a first in an
American film);
- The killing of its major 'star' Janet Leigh a third of the way into the film;
- The shower scene recorded in seven days with more than seventy camera
angles with fifty cuts;
- Bernard Hermann’s soundtrack, with the screeching violins. For the first
time in American film, a soundtrack without drums.

The Plot

A real state office secretary, Marion Crane, steals $40.000,00 from her
boss and travels from Phoenix, Ariz. to Fairvaleii, Calif . to meet her boyfriend
Sam, who knows nothing about his girlfriend’s acts. Marion gets lost during a
rainstorm and checks into the deserted Bates Motel, 20 miles from Fairvale, to
spend the night. There she meets Norman Bates and his Mother Norma. After
that, their destinies would change forever.

Characterization and acting of Norman Bates

Characterization is a literary element; it is about the creation of

characters for narratives. In the novel Psycho, an implicit characterization of
Norman Bates is given. Thus, we get to know him through his interaction with
others characters.
In the novel, Bates is middle-aged, fat, domestic, addicted to alcohol and
unstable; the changeover occurs when Bates is drunk. In the movie, he is
portrayed as young, slender and handsome; the transformation: Norman to
Norma happens in sobriety.
Why all those differences? Alfred Hitchcock wanted the audience to like
Norman because the ‘star’ of the film, Janet Leigh, would have an early
disappearance and Anthony Perkins would show up as the ‘star’ of the movie.
Also, Hitchcock wanted Norman to be public appealing, so as to create an
empathy with him for the surprising ending revelation.
Some critics and biographers state that Anthony Perkins was the perfect
actor for the part of Norman Bates. There are some coincidences in Bates and
Perkins lives. For example, both lost their fathers at the age of five, and also the
fact that they had dominating mothers. But most strikingly, both of them had a
hidden life to keep from the public: Norman was a transvestite killer and Perkins
a homosexual in 1950’s. According to Ronald Berger – Perkins’ Biographer -
many of Bates’ mannerisms and behaviors were Perkin’s own ideas that were
well received by Hitchcock.

REFERENCES

- ALFRED HITCHCOCK AND THE MAKING OF PSYCHO – Stephen

Rebello, 2012
- PSYCHO - Robert Bloch, 1959
- http://heavy.com/movies/get-your-gore-on/2010/10/cleansed-of-your-sins-
ten-facts-about-the-shower-scene-of-alfred-hitchcocks-psycho/
- http://www.filmsite.org/psyc.html
- http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054215/
- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=91947125

i
Howard Phillips Lovecraft was an American author who achieved posthumous fame through his
influential works of horror fiction.
ii
A fictional city.