Okay, for all of you asking why Gus Van Sant would choose to recreate a classic film like Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho, I have only one thing to say: Why not? Like a kid in a candy store, Van Sant has recast this masterpiece with an exceptionally gifted crew and has paid homage to one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. And Van Sant’s painstaking mimicry of the original? Hell, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it.
With that said, let’s get to the fun stuff….what’s different in this 1998 version. The new element of color adds a fresh coat of paint, so to speak, to the proceedings. The characters dress in these really strange, often brightly colored retro outfits that sort of defy any specific time-period.
In fact, the entire film seems like an echo through the decades since the original appeared. One character will be listening to her walkman, and the next thing you know, someone’s asking for a switchboard operator to patch them through on a telephone call. Even the characters seem mishmashed; some are so very modern while others are firmly entrenched in the past. This amalgamation of styles and flavors creates a setting for the new Psycho that is pure Hollywood. It is the landscape created by our love affair with images.
The most striking change, though, is that many of the characters come across very differently, despite nearly identical dialogue and camera shots. For example, Anne Heche’s Marion Crane is light years from sex kitten Janet Leigh’s interpretation. Granted, Heche almost seems to be imitating Leigh in many of her scenes. However, her Marion seems much less idealized and ice-cold. Femme fatale is not a title that Anne Heche is going to carry easily anytime soon. Oddly enough, this actually works to her favor. Her Marion is much more sympathetic and likable than Leigh’s. Leigh always struck me as someone who had it coming to her. Heche, on the other hand, conveys a vulnerability that makes you believe her last-minute decision to correct her mistakes. That makes her ultimate demise all the more disturbing.
An extremely pleasant surprise was Viggo Mortensen as Sam Loomis, Marion’s not-so secret lover. I’ve never seen the other Hitchcock remake that he’s in (A Perfect Murder from Dial M For Murder) but I may have to give it a once-over now. Mortensen grabs your attention right away with his sexually charged performance….and not just because he has some really hot skin-shots in the first scene. Every time that Mortensen is on screen, an uncanny heat seems to be emanating from his character. Maybe it’s those overstuffed jeans of his.
This makes for a rather amusing contrast in his scenes with Julianne Moore’s Lila. She infuses Marion’s sis with an undeniably feminist spirit. She doesn’t take kindly to being pampered and serves as the driving force to finding her missing sister. When Lila and Sam go undercover as man and wife to search the hotel, her disgust for ultra-testosterone Loomis is really quite hilarious.
While William H. Macy plays private investigator Milton Arbogast pretty straightforward, there is one consolation: he’s still William H. Macy for crying out loud. This man can recite the phone book and make it interesting.
And, proving that there are no small roles, Robert Forster, who was so amazing in Jackie Brown, delivers the all-important Norman/Mother explanation with Hitchockian deadpan authority (and a straight face). Again, anyone up for five hours of Forster reading his grocery list? This guy’s just too watchable.
Okay, enough teasing…..onto the big debate: How is Vince Vaughn as Norman Bates? Well, first of all, he ain’t Anthony Perkins. Perkins created an absolutely unforgettable screen persona with Norman Bates, and casting someone to try and convey that same boyish and fragile quality would have been a huge mistake. Instead with have a deliciously hunky and volatile Norman with Vince at the helm. As was the case with Heche, he even copies many of the same mannerisms as his predecessor. However, coming out of the rugged and handsome Vaughn, the effects are drastically different. This time around, I felt that Marion really was attracted to Norman, and didn’t just pity him. He looks like a real catch. That is, until his Momma complex comes into play. Vaughn does a mesmerizing job of showing the disintegration of Norman into his psychotic "better half." He devolves into a mass of nervous ticks that convey menace and the unexpected. And this is as it should be. There’s no surprising today’s audience that Norman is dangerous…we already know how it’s all going to turn out. So, why not let Vaughn have some fun with this frighteningly borderline personality.
Some may be surprised that Van Sant didn’t choose to gratuitously raise the levels of nudity, sex and violence in his remake. In fact, when Marion meets her fate, it almost seems unrealistic that there’s not more blood. One of my favorite touches, though, is when Norman is watching Marion through the peephole and we can hear him doing what we’ve known Hitchcock intended all along.
Additionally, Van Sant has inserted shots into both key murders that create sort of a hallucinatory feel to the violence. It is an interesting touch that both distracts from the reverential feel of this remake and makes one wonder what Van Sant could have brought to the table had he decided to shape the project more into his own vision. One hopes that he’ll consider trying his hand at suspense again. He’s proven that he can do a technically virtuoso imitation of a master. The only question remains is whether or not he’ll one day become a master himself.
Rating: 
Psycho - Official Site
