Freudian Theory

We see a wide angle shot of the inside of Norman's house. We can see Lila behind the fruit cellars stair's handrail while looking towards Norman located in the background, who has just entered and is standing in front of the door. In front of Norman is the stairs to the second floor. Norman is looking for Lila in this shot and can't seem to see her. Also in the background is the outside light coming through the shades. This is the only significantly bright thing in this shot, as the rest of it is almost covered by shadows. The camera is relevance to Norman is from a low point of view shot, but at Lila’s head level.

Here we hear a combination of minor key and Low tone strings playing a fast paced piece. This music creates a suspenseful feeling. The diegetic sounds of the door closing and Norman's footsteps as he heads up the stairs followed by the sound of a door opening and closing in the distance can be heard.

These elements come together to create a suspenseful feeling as the audience begin to fear for Lila. The audience worry for Lila, as the audience know that she is in danger due to their being a killer in the house. Due to the many previous murders, the audience begin to feel that Lila may also suffer the same fate. The minor key strings help to establish this feeling as they hint towards the idea of something sinister about to happen. The diegetic sound shows us that Norman is searching the house for Lila, meaning there is limited time until she is found. This further adds to the suspense due to the audience now associating themselves with Lila. This makes the audience completely fear Norman, not only due to what he's previously done but, because if he finds Lila the audience believe he will harm her.

In the first viewing of the film, in this scene the audience is not only fearing Norman but also his mother. The audience does not yet know that his mother is long dead and he is the murderer himself. Yet once the audience learns the truth the fear of Norman only heightens as the audience no-longer fear his mother as the killer. In the later scenes when the audience learn that Norman's murderous ways were due to his mental illness our fear is more placed alongside that. This is because for the majority of the film Norman seemed like a very normal person. Further evidence of this is simply is name, because the name Norman and word normal are the exact same except for one letter. This can also be symbolic of Norman’s behaviour because it is completely normal except for one thing. Therefore learning of his mental illness causing him to murder people makes the audience fear the mental illness he has more than the man himself.

In this scene the audience therefore see themes developed here, which are the dangers of mental illness and that you should trust nobody. These two themes both originate from Norman. This is because he portrayed to be a very normal person but who turns out to be a dangerous murderer. Hence the theme of trust nobody. The theme of the dangers of mental illness is seen through Norman as his mental illness is said to be, in the final scene with the psychiatrist, the root cause of his murderous ways.

Throughout the film the audience have seen Hitchcock explore mental illness through the use of some Sigmund Freud concepts. Freud was a well-known psychologist who state theories about the human mind, many of which are now disproven but weren’t back when Psycho was released. In this particular shot the concepts of conscious and unconscious mind and the Oedipus complex stand out. The Oedipus complex states, in relevant terms, that if a young boy spends too much time with their opposite sexed parent they would submissively be attracted to said person and be jealous of any partner they have. Norman has many characteristics of this, the audience can see that Norman murdered his mother and partner out of jealousy. Yet mentally Norman couldn't comprehend that he had lost his mother. So the unconscious part of his mind became controlled by the concept he had of his mother. Therefore part of him became a murder, who murdered out of jealousy, and another remained completely normal. Ultimately the audience can see that through the use of Norman as a character alone Hitchcock was successful in his intentions. This is because when it is revealed who Norman truly is the audience is shocked into believing the dangers of mental illness and that you shouldn't trust anybody.

However, Hitchcock wasn't just successful in his intentions through Norman but also in this shot. In this shot in particular the audience can see the theme of the dangers of mental illness being symbolically represented through the use of the house. The house can be symbolically representative of Norman's mind. The bottom part/unconscious part of his mind is where his mother is, as well as her being in the fruit cellar of the house. The ground floor is where the audience see Norman before he transforms mentally, this is the normal part of his mind. When he is here is part Norman and part his mother but "He was never all Norman, but he was often only mother". The upstairs area of the house was where Norman went whenever his mother took over his mind. The upstairs area of the house is where the mother usually resided, this could’ve of affected Norman’s unconscious mind into tricking him into thinking she was still up there. Therefore when his mother’s part of his mind took over, he would head up there to where his mother was. Through this symbolism we can see how Lila heading towards the fruit cellar is symbolic of her finding the dangerous part of his mind aka. His mother.

So in this shot the audience can see that Lila is trapped inside the house and in danger. Lila in this shot is also in a cliché pose of someone holding onto prison bars, therefore furthering the idea of her being trapped in the house. However, symbolically she is trapped in Norman's mind which makes Norman's mind seem to the audience to be a dangerous place. Therefore Hitchcock successfully convinces the audience of the theme of the dangers of mental illness, as he shows how dangerous a mentally ill person's mind can be. The theme of trust nobody also comes through in this shot as slowly Norman is going from a trust worth normal person, to now someone searching for Lila to possibly cause her harm. This shot works to establish this theme, beginning to slowly convince the audience of it before outright exposing Norman's true identity which ultimately shocks the audience into believing Hitchcock's intention.

The audience can therefore see ultimately Hitchcock was successful in his intentions through the use of exploring Freudian concepts through Norman in this shot. Part of his success can also be contributed to the time of when this film was released. Back in the 1960's there had been very little research done on mental illness and most people just wrote people with mental illness off as crazy. Therefore when Hitchcock portrayed the antagonist of this film to be controlled by a mental illness the audience agreed due to their little understanding. However, in today's time this portrayal of mental illness would have been shamed for its offensive portrayal of mental illness. Further evidence of Hitchcock successfully convincing the audience is the amount of films that borrowed from the dangers of mental illness theme. Prior to Psycho mental illness hadn’t been portrayed as something outright dangerous. However, after Psycho many other horror films and slashers in particular blamed the killer’s intentions partly or mainly on their mental illness. One of these being Michael Myers from the movie Halloween. This movie was also hugely successful in portraying the idea of the dangers of mental illness as the murderer was partly introduced as someone who escapes from a mental intuition. Therefore we can see that Hitchcock was successful in intentions as he created a trend of mentally ill characters in various successful horror films.