Reading Response 4: Due February 1

Reading Response 4: Due February 1Thomas Leitch, “Hitch Without Hitch”

1. What are the four ways Leitch argues that Van Sant’s Psycho is unusual?

1)Van Sant's psycho was more of a homage to Hitchcock instead of trying to improve on the original.

2) Van Sant used a "soft-focus silhouette of a woman's body seen through a shower curtain" which Hitchcock tried so hard to conceal.

3) The remake's textual closeness to the original, followed the dialogue line by line and camerawork shot by shot with only color and the characters making the biggest difference.

4) Van Sant and Universal tried to create 1998 Psycho with the same alotted time, six week shooting schedule and roughly the same budget in comparison to today's dollar value.

And what “yawning fallacies” are suggested by Van Sant’s approach to the project?

There are two misleading notions about Van Sant's approach, one is that Van Sant is trying to execute the Hitchcock style just as one would try to recreate a picture by Van Gogh. Van Sant was not trying to say that his Psycho is the same, only trying to replicate the style with his own personal twists. The second is the harder Van Sant "tried to be faithful to his model, the more his inevitable myriad changes would stick out."

What are some of the logistical problems Van Sant faced in remaking the film in the 1990s?

Van Sant's model of trying to closely remake Hitchcock's Psycho proved challenging with the decisions of for instance

what props to use, to stay with the mise-en-scene of the 60's or to update with the 90's. (Side note: Im looking

forward to seeing Van Sant's Psycho to see what changes were made.

2. What is the key difference for the audience’s experience of the shower scene in Van Sant’sPsycho?

Van Sant used a "soft-focus silhouette of a woman's body seen through a shower curtain" which Hitchcock tried so hard to conceal. Also, the audience knew for many years that Marian would die this way, therefore not having the same shock appeal as would the audience seeing the 1960 film for the first time and not knowing the storyline.

How is this similar or different from general genre expectations and conventions inspired by Hitchcock’s Psycho?

This scene is different due to Hitchcock working so hard to conceal the woman in the shower scene.

3. What are some of James Naremore’s objections to the Van Sant Psycho, particularly in the area of casting and performance? Naremore states that there are quite a few small differences that make a huge impact in the difference between the two films. He gives several examples, casting Robert Forster as the psychiatrist and making his long climatic explanation of Norman's behavior less pompous "gives the psychiatrist more authority than he deserves," Christopher Doyle's color cinematography "attenuates the force of Hitchcock's brilliant montage sequences," the Bates house now looks "oddly and inexplicably modernized," and Van Sant's more elaborate roll on the close-up of Marion's dead eye "spoils the mood of one of the most famous dissolves in movie history," to name a few. Naremore feels that Van Sant made bad choices whenever he altered any of the film. Naremore is "unhappy with Vince Vaughn's performance because he copies Anthony Perkins's gestures instead of creating a character of his own." He also doesn't like the lightheartedly oblivious Marion, played by Anne Heche.

How does he use the story of the Royal Cook to explain his critical position?

He feel that like the Royal cook no matter how hard another cook would try to replicate a fond recipe, that it would never be the same as the expectations surrounding when the meal that would have been made years ago by someone else. I could ask someone to bake cookies for me like my mom did, but even with the same recipe it would never taste exactly the same because the way i felt when I ate my mom's cookies oh so many years ago. Same is true with Van Sant's Psycho, he can have all the same ingredients but it will never be the same as Hitchcock's Psycho.

4. What are some of William Rothman’s objections to the Van Sant Psycho, particularly in terms of the relationship between Hitchcock’s stylistic system and the creation of meaning?

Rothman's objection is that the same style Van Sant tries to copy can not have the same meaning or any meaning at all (Hitchcock minus, the audience will only see Van Sant's replication as just that..repetition, no meaning behind the dissolves or fades as Hitchcock did. Rothman states that Van Sant copied too closely to "generate any possibility of original meaning."

How does Leitch question some of Rothman’s assumptions about style and meaning?

Leitch questions how Rothman can deny Van Sant any authorship at all.

What are Timothy Gould’s objections to Rothman’s critical assumptions?

Gould argues that Van Sant is distinguishing himself from the "ordinary American moviegoer" and objects to Rothman having this powerful sense of knowing who has authorship and who does not. He feels Rothman was biased even before he wrote his book "Hitchcock - The Murderous Gaze."

5. Why is Hitchcock’s status in academic film studies particularly unique?

Hitchcock is considered "the first Hollywood auteur, receiving "inspiring reams of commentary from every corner of the critical world," based on Hitchcock's stylistic use of "camera movements, gestures, revelations, and philosophical premises, ...and uncanny gravity toward the characters."

What parallel does Leitch make between Naremore’s viewing of Van Sant’s Psycho and Leitch’s students’ viewing of Hitchcock’s Psycho?
Leitch was upset that his students would rather write a paper on a different movie or not even like Hitchcock's Psycho due to the increased expectations the students would have if comparing Hitchcock's Psycho to other suspense movies that we see today, such as I Know What You Did Last Summer. The parallel between the students and Naremore's viewing of Van Sant's Psycho is that Naremare was comparing Hitchcock's initial appeal as was experienced in the 1960's to the recreation of Van Sant's Psycho, as if there could actually be a comparison of which was better. Hitchcock's will always receive a better reaction because the shock effect surrounds Hitchcock's Psycho.

6. Why does Leitch suggest that perhaps Van Sant “out-Hitchcocks Hitchcock”? I'm not sure exactly Leitch is suggesting there. Perhaps that Van Sant stop trying to reproduce or reuse the style of Hitchcock. Leitch makes this final comment that could relate "the very act of defining Hitchcock as Hitchcock simply marks the distance between the Hitchcock we choose to embrace and the Hitchcock we choose to reject, and so condemns us logically to the desire we all share with Gus Van Sant: Hitchcock without Hitchcock." Possibly Leitch is making a statement that Van Sant is trying to pursue the Hitchcock we love without having Hitchcock actually directing.



Steven Jay Schneider, “Gus Van Sant vs. Alfred Hitchcock: A "Psycho" Dossier: Van Sant the Provoca(u)teur”

7. What thematic concerns does Schneider associate with Van Sant’s films, and how do these thematic concerns relate to Van Sant’s Psycho?

Schneider describes Van Sant films to have themes of "subjective experience of troubled, disaffected youths," "Van Sant has become one of the premiere bands of dysfunction, populating his films with a parade of hustlers, junkies, psychopathic weather girls, and troubled geniuses." For me, with the remake of Psycho, I feel Van Sant was creating a test for himself to see how he did on learning the style of Hitchcock to help him grow as a director, as well as pay homage to Hitchcock.

In relation to Van Sant's Psycho Schneider suggests that Van Sant's Psycho follows the similar themes of the troubled youths he would normally have in his films. The two main character's in Psycho are "young and dysfunctional engaing in criminal activity." Also, the road scenes are found in Psycho as Marion drives away from town. Van Sant also uses plots of the protagonist "fantasizing about the road of a ...more promising future."

8. How does Schneider relate the meanings of particular stylistic features in Van Sant’s Psycho to Van Sant’s other films?

Schneider points out that stylistically Van Sant uses signature styles such as "fascination with restricted vision (POV shots though binoculars or fingers, highlighted bits of text, iris-outs, first person narration, and eccentric casting choices." Van Sant "explores this subjectivity at both narrative and purely visual levels" which could be related back to Van Sant's Psycho using the same dissolves as Hitchcock.

9. How does Van Sant’s typical strategy of casting against expectation suggest new or different meanings in Van Sant’sPsycho? (Specifically the casting of Marion, Norman, and Lila?)

Van Sant knew that Anthony Perkins was openly homosexual and Perkin's boyish demeanour worked to his favor in creating the insecure Norman Bates. Casting Vince Vaughn, openly heterosexual, created a distinctive macho heterosexual identity. When deciding the actress for Marion, Van Sant chose Anne Heche, who in this point of time was "gay", creating a new meaning to Van Sant's Psycho, an "indifference to his heterosexual and possessive male gaze." "Van Sant's surprising and frequently criticized decision to have Norman masturbate to a peephole view of Marion stripping down in the bathroom (an example of restricted vision) may just have been a not-too-subtle means of reinforcing his heterosexual orientation in contrast to Perkins, who in the equivalent scene merely stares at Marion ineffectually." Julianne Moore's character was a more dominant "butch" character allowing her to take on independent role than that of Vera Miles.