Psycho
Everyone loves a adept thriller . Unfortunately , they ’re operose to come by . Keeping an interview on the bound of their seat , filch by the action of a cast of characters andsurprised by each sequential game twist , is n’t well-fixed . And a lot of filmmakers practice thrillers as an apology to slack off .
With its scandalous midpoint turn , pitch - perfect filming and editing , intense musical score , and riveting lead carrying out , Alfred Hitchcock ’s 1960 masterpiecePsychois arguably the superlative of the thriller musical style . But in the more than half a one C since it collide with theaters , it ’s faced some tough competition fromother well - made thriller .
Psycho Is The Best: Anthony Perkins’ Norman Bates Is A Haunting Icon
When it comes to horror movie antagonist , there are few more iconic than Anthony Perkins ’ chilling portrait of Norman Bates inPsycho .
What makes him so memorable is that we ’re led to trust he ’s destitute and that his mother is the veridical killer , building to the haunting revelation that he toss off his mum and now dresses up in her clothes to kill others .
Closest Contender: Rear Window
Alfred Hitchcock directed so many gravid thrillers that he place among his own competitor . Of all the masterfully craft thrillers to Hitchcock ’s name ( other thanPsycho , of course ) , fromVertigotoStrangers on a Train , arguably the ok isRear Window .
James Stewart plays as a lensman with a broken leg , confined to a wheelchair . Using his zoom lens , he spies on his neighbors out of boredom and becomes paranoid that one is a manslayer . The suspense in this moving-picture show is top - pass .
Psycho Is The Best: It’s The Peak Of Hitchcockian Suspense
Alfred Hitchcock is often call the " Master of Suspense , ” and he ’s more than deserving of that nickname . Any post - Hitchcock filmmaker who’shelmed a suspenseful masterpiecehas been heavily influence by his work .
By the time he madePsychoin 1960,Hitchcock had perfected his guile . With every gash in just the veracious spot , Psychois the peak of Hitchcockian suspense .
Closest Contender: No Country For Old Men
It ’s hard to classify the genre of the Coen brothers’No Country for Old Men — it could be a crime moving picture , a western , a motion-picture show noir , even a repugnance movie — but it ’s certainly thrilling . Josh Brolin star as a hunter who finds a briefcase full of immediate payment at the site of a drug heap function south , then goes on the getaway with it as he ’s pitilessly pursued by a hit man .
Javier Bardem plays one of cinema ’s all - time most terrifying villains asa callous shape of iniquity , while Tommy Lee Jones acts as a mouthpiece for the picture ’s poignant themes . The realistically bilk plot plough provender into the story ’s examination ofthe import of mindless violence .
Psycho Is The Best: Bernard Herrmann’s Score Creates A Tense Atmosphere
Every filmmaker from David Lynch to George Lucas has attested to the grandness of speech sound in film . It makes up 50 % of the moviegoing experience , and music has a vast influence on the cinematic modality .
Bernard Herrmann ’s score fromPsychois instantly recognisable . It ’s the quintessential thriller score , creating an unbearably tense ambience .
Closest Contender: Memories Of Murder
Long before he directedthe first non - English - spoken communication film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture , Bong Joon - ho helmedMemories of Murder , a haunting 2003 thriller about a serial killer investigation that reveals more about the tec than the Orcinus orca .
It has plenty of the film director ’s signature tune pitch - black humor and societal comment , critiquing the nationalism and modernisation that Bong regard in South Korea .
Psycho Is The Best: It Subverts All The Audience’s Expectations
Hitchcock sets upPsychoas a criminal offense pictorial matter , with Marion Crane embezzling money from her foreman and go on the running play , then turn it into a grisly horror moving picture somewhere in the midriff . Every outlook that the audience has throughout the movie is subverted at some point .
secret plan twirl are tricky , and successfully pulling off just one is a huge cinematic accomplishment , butPsychohastwo .
Closest Contender: The Night Of The Hunter
Robert Mitchum gives one of the creepiest operation of his career inThe Night of the Hunterin the part of Reverend Harry Powell , a sequential killer and self - proclaimed preacher who wants his widow wife ’s nipper to tell him where their at peace father stashed his lot .
Charles Laughton ’s background in theater head to meticulously give away scene , while cinematographer Stanley Cortezbrought unsettling expressionism to the physical composition .
Psycho Is The Best: The Midpoint Twist Is The Greatest In Film History
Even now , when everyone know about the exhibitor execution ( because it ’s one of the most famous scenes in cinema history),Psycho ’s midpoint twiststill has the ability to ball over . And it was even more shocking back in 1960 .
Janet Leigh was one of the biggest stars in Hollywood at the clock time . Her quality was rig up as the admirer . And yet halfway through the movie , when she has a ton of unresolved story threads , she ’s slashed to death in the shower .
Closest Contender: The Silence Of The Lambs
The first and so far only horror movie to make headway the Academy Award for Best Picture , Jonathan Demme’sThe Silence of the Lambsadds a unequalled eddy to the sequent sea wolf thriller . Jodie Foster stars as FBI cub Clarice Starling , who ’s sent to dog down Buffalo Bill , a serial sea wolf who ’s been targeting women . She consult with another serial killer , Hannibal “ the Cannibal ” Lecter , as she investigates Bill ’s crimes .
thriller rarely do as dead box as this . Demme ’s masterpiece has grim violence in coon , butits focal point is on earnest quality developmentand eye - open social comment about being a woman in a male - dominated field .
NEXT : The Silence Of The Lamb : 5 Reasons Clarice Is The Perfect Protagonist ( & 5 Why Hannibal Is The Perfect Villain )
