Psycho

Psycho is a classic thriller which was created in the 1960, wrote by a man called Alfred Hitchcock.

Characters Played:
Marion Crane - Janet Leigh
Norman Bates/ Mother - Anthony Perkins
Sister Lila - Vera Miles
Investigator - Martin Baslam

Basic Summary: 
The film is based around a woman called Marion Crane who cannot help herself when in comes to handling $40,000 of her boss's money and goes on the run with the cash in her hands. However being very paranoid about this she has to be smart and instead of flee'ing to her lover she decides that she need to drive out of the town and go a a more secluded and isolated town where she will not be taken acknowledge off. So she decided to drive to a motel. The motel was owned by a man called Norman Bates who seems to be a very genuine young man who lives with his "mother". However the young man isn't genuine at all and turns out to not only be a murderer but a mentally unstable murderer who has a split personality. Having an attraction to Miss Crane Norman Bate's split personality takes over and his role as his mother takes over brutally murdering Miss Crane in the shower. He seems in the end to have covered his "mothers" tracks however it is not good enough for Miss Crane's sister, lover and private investigator as they discover in the end what really happened. The end of the thriller is when the police get involved and Norman Bates/Mother is imprisoned, resulting in the "Mother" taking the more dominant role and taking over the young man completely.

Why is this film such a good thriller?
When we watch a thriller we love to always be on the edge of our toes. Alfred Hitchcock produced a film which definitely did this for us! There was a fast pace throughout the film, for example the police officer which was constantly stalking Marion while she was trying to get away kept us viewers on the edge of our seat wondering if she was going to get caught or not! Marion trying to get away was at such a fast pace that we couldn't take our eyes of where marion was incase we missed anything.
He also had constant action, so when he quickly changed the action from Marion being on the run to her being murdered to Norman Bates covering up the murder to the private investigator sussing him out... it constantly had action going on and kept us engaged!
Alfred was also a very good producer by having constant resolutions, having the character of Marion being outwitting but also changing it up when adding the twist so Norman was also a main character who was very outwitting. This is shown in psycho when Marion changes her car from the car she first used when she stole the money to a hired car and just as the police officer approached her she drove off getting away as soon as possible. Also shown by the private investigator when he is interrogating Norman on the murder of miss Crane. Albert Hitchcock uses devices such as suspense in the film psycho when Marion's sister Lila is running away from Norman Bates and runs into the house tying to hide, she walks down into the cellar where we think the "Mother" is being held. This makes us want to shout at the screen "don't go down there!" so its holding us at suspense as to what is going to happen which is a key recipe to a good thriller.

The famous shower scene: 

The shower scene is most famous for all the angles and close ups that it lets us see. However we don't actually see much but Hitchcock tricks us into thinking that we see everything. It makes us feel so on edge because we are seeing the woman living and screaming for her last breaths. The running of the water makes the scene more intense as it creates a sound which contrasts with her screams and the inserting of the knife so our brain is all confused on where to look and what to listen to which makes it such a busy and intense scene. The different angles mean that we can see the killer's shadow at one point which makes us gasp and then BAM he stabs her and she cannot see so she cannot fight back, this makes us want to help her it makes us want to do something "fight back! Push him away" it gives us an urge of security which gets us more engaged in the film really showing that it is a good thriller.