I must warn you that this will not be a review of the movie "Psycho" more than it is an examination of why this remake fails. If you haven't seen the original yet, go out and watch it before you read this review. For the purposes of comparison and analysis I will forego spoiler warnings. You have been warned.

It was a project that seemed baffling to many: Gus van Sant, hot on the heels of the underdog success "Good Will Hunting," was making a shot-for-shot remake of "Psycho." Hithcock's best known picture has aged very well; of his middle-period Paramount features, this 1960 film is less dated than the ambitious, color masterpieces he made in the fifties. However, it has the crutch of being in black and white, a necessary decision for the bloody shower scene to pass the strict censorship of the time. It seems to be an understanding these days that a lot of people will refuse to see a black and white film because of an impression of age (and therefore, perhaps, cheesiness?). This is ironic, given that "Psycho" being in black and white in 1960 was probably akin to "Schindler's List" being in black and white in 1993.

What were the motivations behind this remake? To use color to bring a classic to a new audience? If so, then there seem to have been several crucial errors made by the production team that seriously undermine the impact and effectiveness of this version of "Psycho."

I did try to enter the film with an open mind. Of course, I had reservations. "Psycho," after all, was one of my favorite movies, a film that had scared the living daylights out of me when I first saw it as a child. The opening was promising. First came a musical prelude based on Hermann's theme, over the Universal logos, and then a sense of relief as Saul Bass' original title sequence (now in a bright green) played out in much the same way as it did 38 years ago. As the credits faded out, we had our first discrepancy from the original movie: instead of sequence of cuts as the camera moves over the Phoenix skyline, there is a smooth approach from the same distance to the hotel where Marion and Sam are having their tryst, all the way into the window. This change I accepted completely; though different it reflected Hitchcock's original intentions (which had been limited by technology). Around this time, I decided to myself that as long as Van Sant remained true to Hitchcock's intention, the venture might have some value in introducing "Psycho" to today's filmgoers.

First of all, the rumors were right. For the most part, this film is a shot-for-shot remake of the original, down to camera angles, musical cues, and dialogue. Joseph Stefano's script has been slightly updated for the '90s, with the $40,000 becoming $400,000. The disturbing things are the differences, where Van Sant seems to poke through the Hitchcock to the surface. Some of these seem to be completely pointless. A stormcloud during the shower scene. A flash shot of a bizarre-looking woman. A cow in the middle of the road during the murder of Arbogast. I believe at one point Lila Crane says "Wait, let me get my Walkman," a totally superfluous addition in light of the dogged pursuit of duplication evidenced in 95% of the movie.

The major difference, of course, is the color. I read somewhere that Van Sant's intent was to use color in the same meticulous way that Hitchcock did, but in so doing he lost some of the original nuances. When we first meet Janet Leigh, she is wearing a white brassiere. After she steals the money, we see her wearing one that is black. I heard it commented somewhere by one of the costuming people that this was a deliberate decision, and it seems very fitting to reflect a descent from innocence to crime. In this new "Psycho," the transition is from orange to green, which seems to serve no purpose at all other than to have it in any color at all. Most of the color seems used in this way; though Van Sant's palette is just about as vibrant as Hitchcock's, it doesn't seem to serve any purpose towards the story other than to, well, "colorize" it.

For the most part, the cast is very fine. Most notable is Anne Heche, who I found to be surprisingly sympathetic as Marion Crane. Her interactions with Norman are believable although she is more reactive than the introspective tack taken by Janet Leigh in the original. What's missing, though, are her motivations. When she is at home with the $400,000, deciding whether or not to steal it, there seems to be no major crisis of conscience; she furrows her eyebrows a bit, and then smiles. It seems unbelievable that her short scene with Norman would convince her to go back and face the music. Then there is the whole impetus behind the theft: Sam Loomis. In this role, Viggo Mortensen does not seem to be the kind of person worth risking this kind of crime for. For some reason, I got the impression that every word out of his mouth was a lie. When Marion turns up missing, he shows very little worry about her whereabouts or absence, and even comes on to the sister! John Gavin's Loomis was pushing Marion away due to his sense of honor; this slimy character just seems to be avoiding commitment. The opening love scene, so important in setting up these characters and Marion's future actions, here is completely flat. There is no chemistry at all between these two actors.

The most glaring flaw in this remake is the portrayal of Norman Bates by Vince Vaughn. I had a bad feeling when I first saw the ad campaign, where it was pointed out quite clearly that Norman Bates was the "Psycho" of the title, and everything about this portrayal (whether by Vaughn's own decision or that of the director) seems to be trying to underline that. Whereas Anthony Perkins' genius was to present Bates as a likeable but socially awkward young man, with a hint of fire behind his words, Vaughn's Bates is eccentric, shifty, at times angry. He has an unnerving, artificial (and quite annoying) giggle. Heche's reaction to him is exactly what mine would be; you can almost imagine her mouthing the word "psycho." When he's sinking Marion's car into the lake, he breaks into a grin of enjoyment. It's too grotesque, too obvious. Perkins' half-smile in the same scene was more subtle and far more disturbing, as just a hint of Mother leaked to the surface. Whereas Lila's exploration of Norman's room in the original discovered what appeared to be a shrine to lost childhood, she now finds weapons, military posters, toy army men.

This ham-handed lack of subtlety makes it hard to believe that the guilt of Vaughn's Bates would not be immediately obvious to the other characters, and more importantly, to the audience. Ambiguity, after all, was the key to the whole story. Perkins played his part as a perfect balance between innocence and guilt, madness and sanity. His Bates was sympathetic. His fear of Mother, the hints of child abuse, these were all palpably evident in the original "Psycho" but are completely lost here. The ending is not a surprise. It doesn't have any chance at all to be one.

The best performances are turned in by the more minor roles; Julianne Moore is hip and tough as Marion's sister (you wouldn't expect this Lila to be in any danger in a hand-to-hand fight against Bates), and William H. Macy is characteristically excellent as the doomed detective, Arbogast. Other minor performances are quite bad; the woman in the Pat Hitchcock role is terribly miscast (her delivery of her part, the most dated in the script, is completely wooden), and the used car salesman is terrible.

The revamping of Bernard Hermann's original score was supervised by Danny Elfman, and it remains as effective as ever. A lot more dynamic range has been opened up, the sounds cleaner and clearer. I was glad to see the faithful reproduction of the musical cues, mostly because Hermann was as instrumental in creating the mood of "Psycho" as Hitchcock himself was. Oddly enough, the one discrepancy was the delay of the introduction of the strings in the shower scene until after the first knife fall, an odd place to depart from the original.

It would seem that the decision to film in color but remain almost completely true to the original in terms of direction and script would mean only one thing: that this film is intended for the younger demographic who would not watch "Psycho" in its original black and white version. In that case, why paint Norman Bates as the obvious killer? Why not make Marion's inner guilt and conflict more evident? Why subvert Loomis' upstanding image? Why kill the enjoyment and suspense created by the perfect execution of the original? Some could call these flaws on the part of the actors, but it is the job of the director to find these and fix them. The Bates case in particular is so egregious that it almost has to be a conscious choice by Van Sant.

Perhaps the filmmakers thought that Bates' psychoses were too subtle in the original script and that today's audiences need more handholding. If that's how uncreative the audiences are, leave them to "I Still Know What You Did Last Summer." I prefer to think they're smarter than that. However, for whatever reasons they were, the film has been made. Once upon a time, this project may have had a viable reason for existing, but whether by creative decision or creative breakdown it has lost sight of Hitchcock. This is a movie that has sabotaged itself. This new "Psycho" is not only pointless, it's a dangerous film. Dangerous because it robs the audience of the enjoyment of seeing the original for the first time, by giving away the secrets without the proper recipe for effectiveness.

The verdict: Avoid.




Recommended: No

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