A textual analysis of 'Psycho' in terms of creating tension and suspense.

The sequence begins with a medium shot of a blonde woman in her mid-twenties, in a bathroom with a dressing gown, accompanied by a quiet, but quite foreboding score, which itself creates tension for what might happen in the rest of the sequence. Both these factors denote that the woman is a femme fatal, due to her blonde hair and looks, along with the fact she’s alone suggest that something bad may happen to her, because stereotypically in the genre of thriller women are typically portrayed as the victim of crime. Connotations of this suggest that something is going to happen soon, which also ties in with the expectations of the thriller genre.

Moreover, the first action the audience see's the woman make is to throw torn pieces of paper into the toilet and proceed to flush them away. It is denoted that this be incriminating evidence that she is throwing away, which further creates tension for the viewer from the outset that something bad is about to unfold. The audience then sees the woman close the door. She the way in which she closes it, being quite close to the door, to make it firmly shut, acts almost as foreshadowing for the viewer that someone or something is going to burst through it. Had this been a different genre of film there would have been no need to show the closing of the door because it isn’t typically an important factor to take into account, but being the 'Thriller' genre it is included so as to show to the audience to be aware of the door. Following this the woman proceeds to remove her dressing gown. This makes her even more vulnerable than before because she is naked, which again helps to build tension, because even the viewer knows that they wouldn’t want to be caught like this when engaged in a fight.

When the woman enters the shower the view of the audience becomes distorted with the use of camera angles that, for instance, break the 180° rule in order to make them feel awkward from here on which helps to create tension and suggests that something will happen soon. The performance of the actress is one of relief after a long day, which again with the theme of the femme fatal suggests this feeling won’t last, again tying in with the thriller genre expectations. An obscure medium shot of the girl is then used, a large portion of the frame is then left empty with just the translucent curtain shown in it, which suggests someone is coming, which then happens when the audience see's the door fly open and a character walk towards the translucent curtain. The shadowy figure of the character creates tension in the viewer because they know now what is about to happen, with the shadows showing the audience isn’t allowed to know who the killer is until they are revealed later.

Next the curtain is drawn very loudly and a loud screeching score ensues. A knife is clearly visible on the screen, which then makes the score pleonastic with the lunges of the knife towards the woman. crosscutting and quick editing are then employed here to give various shots of what is happening but don’t reveal to much about what is happening e.g. no stabs are physically shown apart for a split second which is quite mild and the killer is never shown. As the killer leaves and the woman are clearly dying, the editing slows down as well as the score, which becomes more pleonastic with the heartbeat of the woman emphasising that she is dying. As she slides down the bathroom wall, tension again is made; the audience starts to feel worried for the character like, who will help her? Will she be found? Can she be saved? This feeling is kept until she rips the curtain off the rail and falls over the tub not moving, with the blood still pouring out of her. The camera then follows the blood into the plughole; a graphic match is made here through a dissolve transition towards the woman’s eye. This is supposed to symbolise the water leaving the tub being similar to the life leaving her eyes.

However whilst this is all happening the water from the shower is still running making the audience again wonder if she will be found and makes the viewer uncomfortable with the constant sound of the water falling. The camera then tracks out of the bathroom towards a newspaper on the bedside table. Viewers will know that this is a key prop and will remember that earlier in the film contained a lot of money. This makes the viewer realise the killer didn’t do this for the money because it has been left behind, and begs the question, why did it happen? This builds suspense for later in the film. A red Herring finally introduced. A boy can be heard yelling, "Mother! Oh God! Mother!" which makes the reader believe that an old woman is the killer, where as it is the boy who is yelling that turns out to be the killer. Finally, the house that the noise comes from appears to be the "haunted mansion" type house typically seen in thriller films again, building suspense for the viewer for the rest of the movie.