Isn't it ironic how Marion's idea of "having dinner respectably" with her "mother's picture on the mantle" comes true in a weird way?
She ends up having dinner respectably with Norman -- not in a cheap motel, but in his parlor... in the shadow of his mother watching over them from her house up the hill.
Those are good points.
Marion rather conjures up an image of a dinner with a "Mother" nearby (a dead one) that finds its match at the Bates Motel parlor, doesn't it?
A few side points emerge from this:
Marion speaks of serving up a "big steak for three" with Lila -- which tells us: Lila has no boyfriend or husband of note. This prepares us for Lila's solo trip to Fairvale and POSSIBLE eventual hookup with Sam in the future.
Norman first offers Marion dinner up at his house("I don't set a fancy table, but the kitchen's awful homey") til Mother puts the kibosh on that and they must eat in the parlor.
In Robert Bloch's novel, Marion(Mary) and Norman DID eat up at the house, in the living room. I expect Hitchcock knew that wouldn't play in the movie -- Mother has to be kept at a far distance from Marion until the shower scene, people would wonder why she doesn't come out during dinner.
Thus, the creation of the parlor(which is decorated much in the Victorian style of Mother, PLUS Norman's stuffed birds) and the creation of the parlor dinner.
And of course, Marion's conjuring of a "respectable" dinner gets one of the great Joe Stefano reverses in the script:
"You make respectability sound...disrespectful."
See also: "I hate eating in an office, its just too ...officious."
Or: "You sure SOUND like a girl who's been married."
"You sure SOUND like a policeman."
Sadly that sandwich which Norman made was her last meal.
shareIt is one of the aspects of Psycho that, upon a second viewing, so much of what Marion does is her "last." Arbogast, too.
When each character enters the movie -- Marion in the hotel room with Sam, Arbogast entering Sam's hardware store(hey, that Sam is bad luck!), one senses a "countdown" beginning that will end in their deaths. As Marion says to Sam about that cheap hotel room, "...when your time is up..." Arbogast's final major interaction before HIS death is his "fatal phone call" to Lila that fulfills his role as a plot device.
But Marion getting that last supper from Norman carries its own sting --- HE invited her, she accepted. One almost wonders, in retrospect, if Norman KNEW he was serving Marion her last supper.
Mother made his mind up for him in the end.
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