The Moment of Psycho: How Alfred Hitchock Taught America to Love Murder

Overview

It was made like a television movie, and completed in less than three months. It killed off its star in forty minutes. There was no happy ending. And it offered the most violent scene to date in American film, punctuated by shrieking strings that seared the national consciousness. Nothing like Psycho had existed before; the movie industry--even America itself--would never be the same. In The Moment of Psycho, film critic David Thomson situates Psycho in Alfred Hitchcock's career, recreating the mood and time when the seminal film erupted onto film screens worldwide. Thomson shows that Psycho was not just a sensation in film: it altered the very nature of our desires. Sex, violence, and horror took on new life. Psycho, all of a sudden, represented all America wanted from a film--and, as Thomson brilliantly demonstrates, still does.

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Author Information

Bio of David Thomson

David Thomson, author of The New Biographical Dictionary of Film, is a regular contributor to The Guardian, The New York Times, Film Comment, Movieline, The New Republic, and Salon. He lives in San Francisco.

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Additional Info

Imprint

Basic Books

Filesize

552.19 KB

Number of Pages

192

eBook ISBN

9780465020096