MovieChat Forums > Psycho (1960) Discussion > Janet at the Wheel

Janet at the Wheel

posted 5 years ago by ecarle (14979)
23 replies | jump to latest

I've been re-reading a book called "Boffo" by the estimable Peter Bart(former Variety editor, Paramount executive and WSJ writer). Its about a passel of hits from movies(Psycho, The Sound of Music, The Godfather), to TV shows(I Love Lucy, All in the Family) to plays(Cats, Mamma Mia) that folks said "couldn't be done," but WAS done.

Here from the Psycho chapter, Bart on the Hitchcock-Janet Leigh collaboration:

"Hitchcock hired(Leigh) for three weeks; one of them was devoted to the forty five seconds of the shower sequence. The fact that (Leigh) filmed forty-five minutes worth of other scenes in less than two weeks is a testament to Hitchcock's promised fast shooting schedule, which encompassed fourteen to eighteen setups a day."

Yeah, that's pretty fast. And one is reminded that whereas Kubrick did 100 takes of the not-very-scary axing of Scatman Crothers in The Shining; Hitchcock on his superfast schedule gave us the shower and staircase murders and made the world scream at the top of their lungs.

But what of Janet Leigh's "non-shower scenes" in Psycho. If we give her ten days(two business weeks ) to film them, how about this long for shooting each:

Sam and Marion in the hotel room(two days)
Marion at the real estate office (two days)
Marion and the cop(one day, on soundstage for Janet)
Marion and California Charlie(one day location; one hour in bathroom soundstage set.)
Marion and Norman, check-in to the parlor scene(one day)
Marion and Norman, parlor scene(two days)

That's nine days(with a "pick up hour" of Marion in California Charlie's bathroom.) And maybe if Hitch got the Sam/Marion or California Charlie scenes done in one day...that leaves time to film Marion fumbling around with the cash at the Bates Motel. Etc.

What does that leave?

Well, it leaves Marion in the car, driving. I suppose Hitchcock could have shot all those shots of Marion driving(some as medium shots, many as close-ups, a couple as extreme close-ups) in ONE DAY if he knew what he wanted and got it.

Consider:

Janet Leigh is placed in a soundstage "mock-up car interior" with a blank process screen behind her. On that process screen will be projected all manner of "background plates" that Hitchcock has already had a second unit crew film, and that he has likely had "marked for numbers" so that each projection "fits" Janet's(Marion's) location as she emotes "behind the wheel."

Thus:

ONE: Marion at the Phoenix crosswalk, sees her boss.
TWO: Marion drives on, in Phoenix.
THREE: Friday night, out of Phoenix, night -- Marion starts to fall asleep.
FOUR: After her verbal confrontation with the cop, Marion drives onto California Highway 99 north, with the cop in the background plate.
FIVE: Marion drives into Bakersfield, California(home of California Charlie.)
SIX: (A big, big stretch of acting) Marion drives north, north north on Highway 99. (Best match-up: the train in the background plate that we had seen as an oncoming POV shot.)

Keep in mind: Hitchcock's second unit had already filmed the "POV shots of what Marion sees ahead of her," but Janet Leigh wasn't needed for those. THOSE shots would be edited into a two-part mix:

POV shots: What Marion sees on the road ahead.
"Marion shots"(with appropriate background plates): Medium shots, close ups , extreme close-ups.

We have read that Hitchcock "directed" Janet Leigh how to react in the car for specific moments: "Oh, look , there's your boss crossing in the intersection. You're shocked, nervous...but you smile and wave."

And what of the "unseen real estate office voices"? We can FIGURE that perhaps those voices were PLAYED(as recorded by the actors) or read aloud(as script) so that Leigh could match her expressions to what she is "hearing in her head."

But I've always wondered: WHO decided that Janet should smile that rather knowing and sadistic smile on Cassidy's imagined words "I'll replace (the money) with her fine soft flesh." Was that a Hitchcock direction, or a Leigh decision? We will never know.

What we do know is this: at least part of Janet Leigh's 1960 Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress in Psycho comes from her detailed, precise facial acting in all of her "Janet at the Wheel" scenes.

And that's right up to the point where the "POV shots ahead" are of the Bates Motel itself...slowly manifesting out of the darkness and rain with what lights are lit, and with NO music on the soundtrack...Janet Leigh ACTED her reactions to her first look at the Bates Motel...and Hitchcock simply had to provide those GREAT POV shots and cut them in.

And this: Janet Leigh appeared at some college -- in Utah -- I think -- in the 90's, to speak about Psycho and the rest of her career(scores of movies including The Manchurian Candidate and Touch of Evil.) She showed a clip of Psycho before she came on stage. Did she choose the shower scene?

No: she chose the sequence of her night drive to the Bates Motel.

She was very proud of her work there.

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

Note in passing: in one of his many filmed interviews about Psycho (for a documentary, for a DVD, I can't remember), Martin Scorsese narrated over clips of Janet and the wheel and pointed out not only Leigh's exemplary acting, but how Hitchcock "centered" the big steering wheel on the screen in a way that put the audience in an impossible position: right in FRONT of the steering wheel. (This is rather like how later, the audience will be put "in the wall" when Mother enters Cabin One to attack Marion.)

Scorsese's point wasn't so much about the camera trickery that put the wheel in the center of the screen, but about how the wheel CENTERED the screen, as big , almost menacing object that rather "controls" Marion...

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

technical bump.

[–] swanstep (2715) 5 years ago

No: she chose the sequence of her night drive to the Bates Motel.
She was very proud of her work there.

They're great scenes alright. They rhyme in various ways with the shower scene (rain like shower water, wiper blades like knives, Marion staring almost directly into camera through the shower spray etc vs her looking across the dashboard at us), and also with visual ideas from Vertigo: the opening black and white credits of parts of a woman's face in darkness as Hermann's score surges, Stewart's hypnotic following of Madeline.

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

They're great scenes alright.

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That's the thing about Psycho. One can "focus in memory" on the big scenes in the movie(the two murders, the fruit cellar climax, the parlor talk)...but there are some incredible OTHER scenes to find all over the place in that movie. And with Marion's drive, we are pulled so intensely into her experience that the effect is pretty emotional.

Indeed, Scorsese, in talking about the "Janet at the wheel" scenes draws attention to those as being among his favorites.

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They rhyme in various ways with the shower scene (rain like shower water, wiper blades like knives, Marion staring almost directly into camera through the shower spray etc vs her looking across the dashboard at us),

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Yes. The idea of Psycho being "effortlessly symbolic" arises here. Exactly HOW pre-planned all of this was, versus "unconscious" as Hitchcock laid it out with his actor(Leigh), his DP, and Herrmann (for the music that swipes WITH the wiper blades)...perhaps we'll never know. But Janet's final parts of her drive and the shower scene are totally joined together by ...water imagery.

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and also with visual ideas from Vertigo: the opening black and white credits of parts of a woman's face in darkness as Hermann's score surges, Stewart's hypnotic following of Madeline.

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Yes, it is interesting how much Vertigo(in Technicolor and VistaVision) and Psycho really "join up." NXNW in between doesn't quite fit like those two do(although Thornhill waiting for the bus and Arbogast waiting the foyer are rhymed.)

But its the MOOD of Vertigo and Psycho that sometimes intermingle. Movies about "men who watch"(oh, yeah, that connects to Rear Window). The "study of the woman in component parts." Scottie's madness versus Marion's madness versus Norman's madness...

[–] jay440 (107) 5 years ago

WHO decided that Janet should smile that rather knowing and sadistic smile on Cassidy's imagined words "I'll replace (the money) with her fine soft flesh." Was that a Hitchcock direction, or a Leigh decision?

Billy Wilder, maybe? Hitchcock was a fan of Double Indemnity and might have borrowed the shot of Stanwyk at the wheel of her (parked) car, staring straight ahead, a tiny smile raising on her face as her husband is murdered offscreen in the seat next to her.
https://twitter.com/BrianCBaer/status/1079394649083527168

[–] swanstep (2715) 5 years ago

@Jay. Good suggestion. Marion's no Phyllis Dietrichson but her smiles when driving are Marion at her most malevolent & Phyllis-like. Hitchcock may well have been inspired by this shot from one of his favorite films.

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

@Jay. Good suggestion.

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I second that motion! A great thought --- the two shots certainly LOOK alike in terms of the lady's expression!

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Marion's no Phyllis Dietrichson

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In the CNN series "The Movies" (currently airing), the TCM host of the "noir" series on that network(Eddie...something) says that "Psycho starts out like a noir" before turning into something else. Marion isn't a Phyllis Dietrichson, but she DOES "feel noir" as she steals the cash out of illicit love(of sorts) and changes into her black underwear and hits the long lonely road.

Marion will be the killed, not the killer...which rather reminds me of how Faye Dunaway in Chinatown SEEMS like a Phyillis Dietrichson femme fatale for much of the film(she's hiding SOMETHING) but turns out to be entirely innocent, a victim(well, with one evidently "consensual" dark secret.)

And this: That malevolent smile comes(as I recall) during or right after the imagined "I'll replace it with her fine soft flesh" remark from Cassidy. So we're not sure who Marion is smiling ABOUT...Cassidy("Hah, I robbed him good!") herself?("Yes, I would deserve that punishment.") Its all very weird...and deep.

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

And rhymed a bit, much later, when Norman inexplicably breaks into a wide grin after Arbogast drives away...and after Norman had been angry at the PI and troubled in his face. But then...he smiles.

I'm reminded of "Sopranos" creator David Chase, directing the episode where Tony's evil mother Livia has a stroke(maybe) before he can kill her(for ordering a hit on her won son), telling actress Nancy Marchand to simply smile from under her oxygen mask up at Tony. WHY is SHE smiling? Happy to see her son? Happy he DIDN'T get killed?(He fought it off) Malevolent? We'll never know.

I picture Hitchcock directing Leigh(in the car) and Perkins(on the porch as Arbogast drives away) to "smile" -- without necessarily telling them WHY. Let the audience wonder. David Chase, meet Alfred Hitchcock.

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

Hitchcock may well have been inspired by this shot from one of his favorite films.

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Yes, the record seems to show that Hitchcock in the forties heaped praise on "Double Indemnity" both in public and in private to Billy Wilder. And yet Wilder seemed to spend his career a bit jealous of Hitchcock ("Always the corpse...always the super-solution.")

We also know that, by the 1959/1960 cusp, three big directors -- Hitchcock, Wilder, and Preminger -- seemed to have formed the "Hays Code Needling Society" -- with Anatomy of a Murder, Some Like It Hot, The Apartment and Psycho. And yet, they were playing that game pretty good in the forties, too -- with Double Indemnity, Laura, and Notorious, to name three.

[–] jay440 (107) 5 years ago

Hitchcock wrote to Wilder "since Double Indemnity, the two most important words in motion pictures are 'Billy' and 'Wilder'." I think the only other time I've come across a compliment from Hitchcock to another director is in Spoto's Dark Side of Genius, when, after seeing Antonioni's Blow-up, he is reported to have remarked that "the Italians" were "a century ahead" of him in technique. It's been pointed out that The Birds seems to have had some influences from Antonioni and other Italian arthouse cinema.

Double Indemnity was possibly as influential, in it's day, as Psycho. It looks like Hitchcock tried to capture some of Indemnity's mojo by recruiting Wilder's screenplay collaborator on that film, hard-boiled novelist Raymond Chandler, to work on Strangers on a Train, with it's equally twisted murder plot. Both collaborations were unhappy ones, unavoidable probably, given Chandler's alcoholism and sour bent. Chandler actually relapsed during the writing of Indemnity, something Wilder later gloated about in an interview. His next film after Indemnity was The Lost Weekend, about an alcoholic writer who relapses into DTs.

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

Hitchcock wrote to Wilder "since Double Indemnity, the two most important words in motion pictures are 'Billy' and 'Wilder'."

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Yes...Hitch did. Rare praise. I'm pretty sure that Hitch and Wilder watched each others films and influenced each other. Perhaps Wilder got there first with something like Sunset Boulevard..but Hitch knew how to "up the ante" on a story like that by converting the Goth(and the madwoman) into a shocker like Psycho.

BTW, Wilder MUCH preferred b/w as often as he could -- and as long as he could. While Hitchcock was ONLY making Psycho in b/w Wilder did Love in the Afternoon(right after Hitchcock's b/w Wrong Man), Witness for the Prosecution, Some Like It Hot, The Apartment, One Two Three, Kiss Me Stupid, The Fortune Cookie -- with one color film in there(Irma La Douce) that looked like a b/w decorated set filmed in color.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

I think the only other time I've come across a compliment from Hitchcock to another director is in Spoto's Dark Side of Genius, when, after seeing Antonioni's Blow-up, he is reported to have remarked that "the Italians" were "a century ahead" of him in technique. It's been pointed out that The Birds seems to have had some influences from Antonioni and other Italian arthouse cinema.

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I think Patrick MacGilligan found Hitchcock getting influenced a LOT in the period from The Wrong Man on: The Wrong Man(Italian neorealism), Vertigo (French influences, including Diabolique), Psycho(everybody We've named) The Birds(Antonioni et al...mainly in the "unexplainable" plot and the "non-ending, Marnie(Douglas Sirk AND the popular "Southern Gothic melodramas" of the time, per Tennessee Williams, Summer and Smoke, Toys in the Attic, etc), Torn Curtain(The Spy Who Came In From the Cold with a dash of Bond) Topaz(French films again)...Frenzy(British psychopath films like Twisted Nerve)...Family Plot(The Sting, Charley Varrick...good crooks vs bad crooks.)

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

Double Indemnity was possibly as influential, in it's day, as Psycho.

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As with Psycho, DI seemed to have lured audiences in with word of "seeing things they usually weren't allowed to see" like adultery, murder from the plotters' side, and a certain rottenness to the whole enterprise(less Eddie G's wonderfully honest insurance claims man -- he's a non-victim forerunner of Arbogast in employment AND look.)

And this: Fred MacMurray gave us such a SYMPATHETIC killer. He's laying the groundwork for the more chump-like William Hurt in Body Heat(though less so for both male leads of The Postman Always Rings Twice.) We come to understand how a "regular guy" could be turned murderer for the right reasons(sexual, yes...but something more.)

I think MacMurray is much more hateable in Wilder's "The Apartment"(where all he kills is his lover's hope and careers) than in Double Indemnity.

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It looks like Hitchcock tried to capture some of Indemnity's mojo by recruiting Wilder's screenplay collaborator on that film, hard-boiled novelist Raymond Chandler, to work on Strangers on a Train, with it's equally twisted murder plot. Both collaborations were unhappy ones, unavoidable probably, given Chandler's alcoholism and sour bent. Chandler actually relapsed during the writing of Indemnity, something Wilder later gloated about in an interview. His next film after Indemnity was The Lost Weekend, about an alcoholic writer who relapses into DTs.

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I've read of Chandler's run-ins with both Wilder and Hitch, and I get the feeling he simply wasn't up to dealing with two such towering Hollywood egos. He insulted each of them, too. He wrote little of either film. And yet -- his name ended up in the credits of those movies. The studios DEMANDED it.

[–] swanstep (2715) 5 years ago

I'm reminded of "Sopranos" creator David Chase, directing the episode where Tony's evil mother Livia has a stroke(maybe) before he can kill her(for ordering a hit on her won son), telling actress Nancy Marchand to simply smile from under her oxygen mask up at Tony. WHY is SHE smiling? Happy to see her son? Happy he DIDN'T get killed?(He fought it off) Malevolent? We'll never know.

That was so great. Season 1 of The Sopranos is pretty much perfect.

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

David Chase, directing the episode where Tony's evil mother Livia has a stroke(maybe) before he can kill her(for ordering a hit on her won son), telling actress Nancy Marchand to simply smile from under her oxygen mask up at Tony. WHY is SHE smiling? Happy to see her son? Happy he DIDN'T get killed?(He fought it off) Malevolent? We'll never know.
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That was so great.

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From Wilder to Hitchcock to Chase: simply recommending to an actor that they smile(without telling them WHY they are smiling) seems to be a solid creative choice.

I'm reminded that Chase is a big Hitchcock fan, and tossed many references to Psycho throughout The Sopranos. A subtle one: on someone's visit to a mental institution, Chase(his writers, his director, HIS idea) cuts to one shot of an inmate laughing and then one shot of an inmate crying. Remember: "Have you ever seen the inside of one of those places? The laughter and the tears?"

Of course, The Sopranos posited a criminal man dominated by a crazy mother so...there you go.

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Season 1 of The Sopranos is pretty much perfect.

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I'm also reminded that David Chase said "at that point when we filmed that first season, we had no idea if there would be a SECOND season. So we put everything in there, and brought it to an end like a movie."

I think showrunner Matt Weiner said the same thing about Season One of Mad Men.

[–] swanstep (2715) 5 years ago

the shot of Stanwyk at the wheel of her (parked) car, staring straight ahead, a tiny smile raising on her face as her husband is murdered offscreen in the seat next to her.

It's a curious shot in one key respect: we of course never see the killing & it is somewhat hard to believe that Neff could kill Dietrichson with his bare hands from the back seat with so little struggle (i.e. not enough to bump or trouble Phyllis at all... maybe if Neff had Special Forces training!). At least Post-Strangers on A Train or Dial M it's hard to accept that killing someone at such close quarters can ever be quite that simple. Here's the description of the key shot from the script:
****
There are struggling noises and a dull sound of something breaking. Phyllis drives on
and never turns her head. She stares straight in front of her. Her teeth are clenched.
****
Watching and listening carefully to the scene again I can't hear anything crack or break. I dare say that if Wilder makes DI even 5 years later then assuming the camera stays on Phyllis we'd *hear* a lot more, maybe a full sickening crunch/snap. Note too how little teeth-clenching there is in Stanwyck's performance, instead she's got that eerie semi-smile. I wonder whether Wilder directed her to do that or whether that was more her choice that Wilder just liked (the answer's probably out there)?

[–] jay440 (107) 5 years ago

I misremembered the scene in my post above, I thought the car was parked but, on rewatch, yes, she was still driving. I think it's the lack of background in the shot, because she purposely turns onto a dark street with no other cars to witness the crime.

The "sickening crunch" has been with us awhile (it's even listed as "Sickening crunch" on the website TVtropes) but, aside from The 3 Stooges, it seems more of a modern-day thing. I have to admit I find it revolting and off-putting, and it takes me out of the scene right away. A recent ugly example is Red Sparrow, Jennifer Lawrence's Russian honeypot movie SPOILER POSSIBLY (or not since it happens at the very beginning): she's a ballet dancer for the Bolshoi, and her dance partner does a giant leap up and lands on her lower leg with a gigantic CRUNCH!! that shoots her leg into a horrific angle.

I wish I knew if that "eerie semi-smile" was Wilder's idea or Stanwyk's. I want to think Wilder saw a hint of it in one of her earlier performances and mentally tucked it away for future use.

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

I misremembered the scene in my post above, I thought the car was parked but, on rewatch, yes, she was still driving.

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Better, I suppose, to avoid witnesses...staying in motion.

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I think it's the lack of background in the shot, because she purposely turns onto a dark street with no other cars to witness the crime.

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Yes...thinking ahead there. Dark streets...used for necking in cars and murders in cars.

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The "sickening crunch" has been with us awhile (it's even listed as "Sickening crunch" on the website TVtropes)

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Hah.

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but, aside from The 3 Stooges, it seems more of a modern-day thing.

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As we discuss elsewhere in the thread, the censors seem to have allowed more grisly sound effects as the years went on.

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I have to admit I find it revolting and off-putting, and it takes me out of the scene right away.

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Depends on the scene, I suppose. Sure can WORK on the stomach...

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A recent ugly example is Red Sparrow, Jennifer Lawrence's Russian honeypot movie SPOILER POSSIBLY (or not since it happens at the very beginning): she's a ballet dancer for the Bolshoi, and her dance partner does a giant leap up and lands on her lower leg with a gigantic CRUNCH!! that shoots her leg into a horrific angle.

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I closed my eyes...but still heard the crunch. No escape.

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I wish I knew if that "eerie semi-smile" was Wilder's idea or Stanwyk's. I want to think Wilder saw a hint of it in one of her earlier performances and mentally tucked it away for future use.

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I expect that directors do that -- and then see if they can con the actor into doing it again.

Some of Tony Perkins "breakdown" in the fruit cellar at the end of Psycho mimics a more VIOLENT breakdown as real-life ballplayer Jim Piersall in Fear Strikes Out -- which Hitchcock saw and which inspired him to cast Perkins as Bates.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

Speaking of Hitchcock sound effects, HERE is a grisly one:

Mid-way through the everything-but-the-kitchen sink killing of Gromek in Torn Curtain, as Newman holds Gromek in a grip, the "farmer's wife" starts hitting the man's SHINS with a SHOVEL. Each blow of the shovel to shin bone resounds in a sickening "clang" -- you can almost FEEL the pain.

Except, mercifully, really..you can't.

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

Watching and listening carefully to the scene again I can't hear anything crack or break.

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I'm reminded here that grisly sound effects can be a censor's target.

But I'm ALSO reminded that by 1960, Hitchcock was not only able to get the grisly sound effect of "knife puncturing body" into Psycho...he got that sound onto the track ELEVEN times(with the shower murder) and then three more with the Arbogast murder(the sound is used the first time for the slashing of Arbogast's face, then for two stabs below the frame.)

By 1972, sound effects could be pretty grisly and a sound guy on Frenzy used crowbar on melon to get the sound of Blaney's tire iron hitting the sleeping head of intended victim Bob Rusk.(But it ain't Rusk.) The sound man delivered the effects tape with a gag bloody bandage around his head.

That "cracking" sound is pretty key in movies like Enter the Dragon to say "spine is broken, victim is dead." I recall Roy Scheider applying a final knee-to-spine move on an assassin in "Marathon Man" that ended with that crack( I daresay the victim actor looked like he was glad it was over.) The audience gave out a collective groan.

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I dare say that if Wilder makes DI even 5 years later then assuming the camera stays on Phyllis we'd *hear* a lot more, maybe a full sickening crunch/snap.

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Likely...yes.

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Note too how little teeth-clenching there is in Stanwyck's performance,

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When you say that, I think of the Malibu security gate guard in Altman's "The Long Goodbye"(from Raymond Chandler) doing HIS teeth-clenched impression of Stanwyck for Elliot Gould's Marlowe.

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instead she's got that eerie semi-smile. I wonder whether Wilder directed her to do that or whether that was more her choice that Wilder just liked (the answer's probably out there)?

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Stanwyk and Wilder. Hitchcock and Leigh. Smiles of a car driver. Those "moments we may never know."

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

Back to Janet at the wheel.

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While wondering if Hitchcock or Leigh came up with Marion's weird smile during Cassidy's ugly remarks, I made a quick trip to the Stefano screenplay.

HE didn't write it.

Also, I looked at the scene on my DVD.

And so for your edification:

Script:

CASSIDY'S VOICE
(Undrunk, sharp with rage)

Well, I ain't about to kiss off forty thousand dollars! I'll get it back and if any of it's missin',
I'll replace it with her fine soft flesh! I'll track her, never you doubt it!

LOWERY'S VOICE

Hold on, Cassidy..I still can't believe...it must be some kind of a mystery..I cant--

CASSIDY'S VOICE

You checked with the bank, no? They never laid eyes on her, no? You still trustin'?
Hot creepers! She sat there while I dumped it out, hardly even looked at it, plannin' and even flirtin' with me!

A look of revulsion makes Mary close her eyes.

(END)

So.." a look of revulsion makes Mary close her eyes" becomes that smile. SOMEBODY made a big change. I'm guessing Hitchcock. For one reason, on the dialogue above, Hitch cuts to a tight close-up of Leigh. He planned the camera angle...I daresay he wanted something more "lingering" than in the script. (The shots before this one of Leigh, alternating with POVS of the road ahead are, first: medium shot on Leigh(dusk), close up on Leigh(dark, headlights behind her); TIGHT CLOSE-UP (Cassidy's lines, the "smile.")

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

And a little analysis OF that screenplay section:

Script:

CASSIDY'S VOICE
(Undrunk, sharp with rage)

"Undrunk"...hah... is that a word? But its a feeling. Cassidy "undrunk" is a pretty mean guy.

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Well, I ain't about to kiss off forty thousand dollars!

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"Kiss off" is somewhat of a "Hays Code approved" cuss word. Stefano cannily seeds them all through Cassidy's speech.

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I'll get it back and if any of it's missin',
I'll replace it with her fine soft flesh!

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Honestly...one of the creepiest , somewhat sickening lines in a non-R movie.

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I'll track her, never you doubt it!

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As this is MARION"S fantasy, she is already looking ahead to...Arbogast.

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LOWERY'S VOICE

Hold on, Cassidy..I still can't believe...it must be some kind of a mystery..

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I've always kind of liked Lowery -- in Marion's imaginings -- trying to calm Cassidy down...and I've always liked his phrase "it must be some kind of mystery". Lowery's been watching too many Hitchcock movies.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

I cant--

CASSIDY'S VOICE

You checked with the bank, no? They never laid eyes on her, no? You still trustin'?
Hot creepers!
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Stefano said when he returned to his 1960 script for a touch-up for the Van Sant(and got paid more than Hitchcock paid him! Yay! The BEST thing about Van Sant's Psycho!)

...he couldn't believe he wrote the phrase "hot creepers." Likely it was more "Hays Code approved cussing." Maybe his grandpa said it?

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She sat there while I dumped it out,

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There's something...scatological about that phrase to me. "Dumped it out." In any event, it is a coarse phrase.

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hardly even looked at it, plannin'

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Its Marion's thoughts again..but maybe this: she KNEW that Cassidy wanted to seduce her with that money(for sex) and she refused to give him that satisfaction.

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and even flirtin' with me!

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Well, that's flat out a joke...maybe meant to lessen the ugliness of Cassidy's earlier words, and a throwback of course to Caroline's joke: "He was FLIRTING with you! He must have noticed my wedding ring."

Some nice precision there by Stefano...a "call back" that Marion remembers herself...

And this: as the shots draw closer and closer to Leigh's face, that steering wheel that so transfixed Scorsese...disappears for the Leigh close-ups.