Taglines: Behind every Psycho is a great woman.
In 1959, Alfred Hitchcock opens his latest film, North by Northwest, to considerable success, but is troubled by a reporter’s insinuation that he should retire. Seeking to reclaim the artistic daring of his youth, Hitchcock turns down film proposals, including Casino Royale and The Diary of Anne Frank, in favor of a horror novel called Psycho by Robert Bloch, based on the real-life crimes of murderer Ed Gein.
Gein appears in sequences throughout the film, in which he seems to prompt Hitchcock’s imagination regarding the Psycho story, or act as some function of Hitchcock’s subconscious mind (for instance, drawing Hitchcock’s attention to sand on his bathroom floor, the quantity of which reveals how much time his wife Alma has been spending at the beach house with Whitfield Cook). Hitchcock’s wife and artistic collaborator, Alma, is no more enthusiastic about the idea than his colleagues, especially since she is being lobbied by their writer friend, Whitfield Cook, to look at his own screenplay.
However, she warms to Hitchcock’s proposal, suggesting the innovative plot turn of killing the female lead early in the film. The studio heads at Paramount prove more difficult to persuade, forcing Hitchcock to finance the film personally and use his Alfred Hitchcock Presents television crew (over at competitor Revue/Universal) to shoot the film, his last with Paramount.
Hitchcock is a 2012 American biographical drama film directed by Sacha Gervasi, based on Stephen Rebello’s non-fiction book Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho. The film was released in selected cities on November 23, 2012,[4] with a worldwide release on December 14, 2012. Hitchcock centers on the relationship between film director Alfred Hitchcock (Anthony Hopkins) and his wife Alma Reville (Helen Mirren) during the making of Psycho, a controversial horror film that became one of the most acclaimed and influential works in the filmmaker’s career.
Hitchcock (2012)
Directed by: Sacha Gervasi
Starring: Anthony Hopkins, Helen Mirren, Scarlett Johansson, Danny Huston, Toni Collette, Michael Stuhlbarg, Michael Wincott, Jessica Biel, Tara Summers, Ralph Macchio, Kurtwood Smith
Screenplay by: John J. McLaughlin
Production Design by: Judy Becker
Cinematography by: Jeff Cronenweth
Film Editing by: Pamela Martin
Costume Design by: Julie Weiss
Set Decoration by: Robert Gould
Art Direction by: Alexander Wei
Music by: Danny Elfman
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for some violent images, sexual content and thematic material.
Distributed by: Fox Searchlight Pictures
Release Date: December 14, 2012
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