Psycho (1960)

 Psycho (1960)

The movie in large part was made because Sir Alfred Hitchcock was fed up with the big-budget, star-studded movies he had recently been making and wanted to experiment with the more efficient, sparser style of television filmmaking. He ultimately used a crew consisting mostly of television veterans and hired actors and actresses less well-known than those he usually used. Specifically, Vertigo (1958), which was later hailed as a masterpiece, was considered a bloated, over-budgeted misfire. And while North by Northwest (1959) was hailed as a masterpiece and was a hit, it was a huge production, and it was also very time-consuming and expensive. So Hitchcock decided to scale things back for his next movie. Also, during the same period, his rival, French new wave and noir film director Henri-Georges Clouzot, hit the bullseye and created a critical box office sensation with the classic Diabolique (1955). All the critics said Clouzot had out-Hitchcocked Hitchcock, and this presented a confrontation which Hitchcock could not turn down. Diabolique was a small scale, gritty, black and white independent movie, so Hitchcock decided to out-Diabolique Diabolique and directed his own small scale, gritty black and white project - that was Psycho.