Butchering A Classic
A Review with Extreme Prejudice

When I heard that Psycho was going to be remade, my gut instinct was to avoid it at all cost. Then, I saw Christopher Reeve in last month's ABC television remake of Rear Window. Reeve and company did an excellent job, and I began to hope that maybe Van Sant could do Psycho justice. I see now that I should learn to trust those gut instincts.

I had planned to avoid Gus Van Sant's remake of Alfred Hitchcock's, Psycho, on general principles. In fact, a friend and I recently discussed how it was wrong that the classic film was being remade. Nevertheless, I felt that my role as movie reviewer required me to see it, just so I could give an informed opinion.

In the remake, Anne Heche plays Marion Crane, a quiet, unsuspecting woman who steals $400,000 from her employer. On the run, afraid of being caught, she drives two days toward her boyfriend's home. When it begins to rain heavily on the second night, she decides to check in to a motel. Vince Vaughn (Swingers) plays the pivotal role of Norman Bates, the strange caretaker of the Bates Motel.

The rest, as they say, is movie history. In this case, it's actually true. As a classic of movie making, the story of Psycho with all its twists, are common knowledge. This, in part, removes some of the suspense from the remake.

The media has been filled with stories about Van Sant's decision to reshoot the classic film, using the original shooting script. Among his reasons, he says he wanted to make the story accessible to a new generation of people who did not get the opportunity to see the original on the big screen. Van Sant said, "I thought this was a way of popularizing a classic, a way I'd never seen before. It was like staging a contemporary production of a classic play while remaining true to the original."

For all his good intentions, however, his words ring as hollow justifications for a horrible crime. What Van Sant has done does not honor Hitchcock, but merely capitalize on the masterpiece of suspense that has defined horror movies for a generation. Van Sant does not attempt to reshoot the film with his own eye, but rather chooses to steal directly from Hitchcock.

Most appalling, however, is the fact that Van Sant has chosen to cheapen the story with the gratuitous use of nudity and pornographic sound effects. For someone supposedly shooting from Hitchcock's script, Van Sant chose some horrible ways to deviate from it. There is no way that Hitchcock's 1960 classic would have an R rating. Why should the remake? Van Sant, in modern Hollywood style, is not content to leave anything to the audience's imagination.

Vaughn's portrayal of Norman is sometimes clever, but his acting is never subtle. Whereas Anthony Perkins originally played Norman as shy and fragile, Vaughn is just too big and manly to exude any sort of vulnerability. He looks like a mass murder, not a frightened loner. Heche, while perfecting the "doe caught in headlights" look, adds nothing to the role of Marion. Simply stated, a good actress is wasted here.

There are a couple of good performances by the supporting cast. Most notable is William H. Macy as the private detective Arbogast. His acting and style are so dead on that he looks as if he belongs in classic movies, playing quirky secondary roles. There is also a delightful cameo at the end by Robert Forester, who also appeared in the television remake of Hitchcock's Rear Window.

I would urge people to avoid this movie as a way of telling Hollywood we do not want to see this kind of butchery again. Let the film makers continue dredging up old television shows and making sequels, but leave the classics alone. If we don't, we could see Casablanca remade with Ben Stiller and Cameron Diaz.

MY RATING: 0 out of 10.

RATED: R
RUN TIME: 109 min.