Analyses of relevant key texts

The thriller genre is often associated with Alfred Hitchcock, 'The Master of Suspense' and so I find it fitting to analyse a scene of one of his most famous films in research of the genre of Thriller. I will be analysing the shower scene from his 1960 film, 'Psycho'.



Firstly, an obvious observation of the scene is that it contains no dialogue. This creates anticipation and tension as there is no explanation of what happens, a common convention of thriller films. The scene starts with the character, Marion Crane, flushes a piece of ripped-up paper down the toilet. This creates an enigma concerning what was it she flushed down the toilet? She is a young, attractive blonde woman; the audience does not expect her to die at this stage of the film as she is a protagonist. Her appearance also gives the idea of innocence and so there is shock and tension created when she is murdered. The setting of the scene, a shower is a realistic one that causes the audience to not expect an act of murder, as the shower is not a place you would associate with such an act. The silence of the scene is foreboding her murder as non-diegetic sound comes in as the killer does.

A common feature of the thriller genre, dramatic irony now takes place as the murder does. The audience can see the silhouette of the murderer as he enters the bathroom due to the low-key lighting which creates suspense as we can foresee the killing. Furthermore, the killer appears to be female, which we later find out to be male, this creates a red herring as it diverts the audience from the truth and plays with the hierarchy of knowledge. As the murder takes place, pleonastic sound enters to mimic the action of the knife; this creates suspense the sound can be confusing to what is happening. Furthermore, the use of the knife to commit the murder creates suspense as it leads to a slow death, not an instant one in the case of a weapon such as a gun, a common technique in thriller films. There is also quick edits between the killer and the victim during the murder, this creates anticipation and tension as we can see both views of what is happening.

The death of Marion Crane is slow and non-diegetic orchestral sound replaces the pleonastic sound. This orchestral score ranges in pitch as the character slumps to the floor during the slow death. This creates anticipation and tension as the audience is left in shock of what just happened, the protagonist dying. The camera then tilts down to the drain with the implementing of graphic match between the drain and the character’s eye to connote the life leaving her; this creates tension as she has now died. The scene then ends with the camera moving from bathroom to bedroom, which can be accepted as the killer’s movement from the murder scene. Also, the camera zooms into the money that Marion Crane stole. These two features create anticipation and suspense as we can see the killer has not taken the money, which suggests this was a random murder.