Quartile rating: 8.5/10 · 1 rating
When larcenous real estate clerk Marion Crane goes on the lam with a wad of cash and hopes of starting a new life, she ends up at the notorious Bates Motel, where manager Norman Bates cares for his housebound mother.
Psycho is a landmark of cinema — Hitchcock's direction, Bernard Herrmann's score, and John L. Russell's stark black-and-white photography are all exceptional. The plot structure is genuinely audacious, killing its apparent protagonist a third of the way through and pivoting the entire film. Anthony Perkins delivers one of cinema's most iconic performances as Norman Bates. Novelty is off the charts — no film had done what Psycho did at the time, and its DNA is still visible in horror and thriller filmmaking. The ending slightly undercuts the mystery with an overly expository psychiatrist's monologue that over-explains Norman's psychology, robbing the finale of some of its earned ambiguity — keeping Ending at 3.