Psycho

Women, Noir, Hitchcock

Other Bodies In The Swamp

In The Moment of Psycho: How Alfred Hitchcock Taught America To Love Murder, David Thomson dedicates a chapter to movies deeply influenced by the 1960 thriller. The list is long and full of wonderful insights. Definitely buy the book for the full experience.

A few highlights:

  • Klute (1971): “Klute ends with with the killer killed, but there are so many other things to be afraid of, not least the climate of paranoia.”

  • Don’t Look Now (1973): “This is the Daphne Du Maurier story that Hitchcock did not take up. … There in the middle it has one of the most uninhibited love scenes ever filmed (Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie). In its warmth and tenderness, and in its solace for two wounded people, it is not just unlike anything in Hitchcock, it is beyond him.”

  • Dressed To Kill (1980): “It was camp Hitchcock, a summer vacation Psycho for rich kids.”