This is How Movies Should Be Made

A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Anthony Perkins owns the character of Norman Bates. He could have made 20 sequels to Psycho and he would be fascinating in every second of every one of them. There is a scene where he is walking to a room at the motel and he thinks "mother" is there and the look on his face is priceless, it's a sort of bemused haze. The movie has elements of a dark comedy and ridiculous camp. There is a scene between Perkins and Jeff Fahey that is absolutely hysterical. Honestly, I'm not even sure how I feel about this movie. On one hand, I don't think it's good but, I find it very watchable. For me it exists in the bad/fun bad arena. Ultimately, I would recommend it to someone who wants to watch an actor own a character like few actors have ever owned a character. Have a few dark laughs and shake your head at the mismatched parts. Psycho 3 might just work for you.

Alfred Hitchcock, the director of the incredible original "Psycho" film, despised the very concept of sequels and refused to make even a single one during his film career. Movies like this are exactly why.For a basic plot summary, "Psycho III" sees Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) still running his hotel business and still harboring the embalmed corpse of Emma Spool, his supposed "real mother". When a young nun (Diana Scarwid) who bears a striking resemblance to Marion Crane needs a place to stay, Norman takes her in and clashes with "mother" once again.The strange thing about this movie is that, storyline-wise, it really isn't all that bad. Basically, it isn't just bad for bad's sake, and director Perkins does a great job of re-creating the continuity from "Psycho II" and making this film feel like part of the anthology.The problem, though, is that "Psycho III" doesn't know what kind of flick it is. It tries to be a slasher film for a while, but the overall Psycho narrative doesn't lend itself to that. It also tries to look at Bates' insanity from a new perspective, but only ends up muddying the waters even further. Plus, a religious aspect is introduced into the narrative, but doesn't accomplish anything in terms of character development.Thus, this seems to me to be a film that started off with great intentions, but quickly descended (production-wise) into a nightmare. A few moments are decent enough for the franchise fans to keep watching, but others will just find it stupid. This effort can easily be skipped in the series.

This directorial debut by lead actor Anthony Perkins is a great example of an overlooked movie that makes for a neat and rather amusing viewing experience. It manages to shine a bit more light on Normans condition and helps extend the Bates universe, it also adds a boorish debauchee named Duke. Norman has returned to his seemingly harmless pushover but elusive characteristics that he forms to shield him from close scrutiny. The themes of exclusion and the connection of adrift people present to us more depth; it shows that empathy is real in him and help us to relate to Norman. At the same time we are lead on a rather mild but bumpy roller coaster ride of a narrative.Quotes of interest -"The past is never really past, it stays with me all the time, no matter how hard I try, I cant really escape, its always there, throbbing inside you, colouring your perceptions of the world and sometimes..controlling them" - Norman (Anthony Perkins)"I wouldn't mind filling in until you find somebody permanent, I just wont be staying around too long" - Duke (Jeff Fahey) "No one ever does" - Norman (Anthony Perkins)At this moment a stuffed owl in a display of mid flight looms over Norman as he speaks, glaring intensely , Norman replicates the stare."Murderers are victims too" - Tracy Venable (Roberta Maxwell) Cupids arrow plays a vital role in the conclusion of this movie that I think is trying to emote to us that love hurts, especially if you encounter the wrong companion. Overall the editing in this movie is consistently good, the dialogue kept up with the pace, the underrated soundtrack worked very well with the sound design overall to build up the surrounding events, and the SFX are all performed to a nice level, if sometimes a little sun drenched. It feels like Anthony Perkins was giving his all to the direction of this movie and also to the character he plays so very well. I enjoyed it. Interesting morbid facts - Lead actor Anthony Perkins played Norman Bates in all 4 Psycho movies, he died from aids related Pneumonia during the filming of psycho 4. His widow (Berry Berenson), a famous artist and model, died as a passenger on American Airlines flight 11 on September 11th 2001.

Anthony Perkins directed the third installment of the psycho series and early on it was clear to see he wanted to make it his own. The beginning of the movie introduces two main characters played by Diana Scarwid and Jeff Fahey who cross paths at Bates Motel. The movie took awhile to develop but it held my interest throughout. Bring back the sheriff, cook and back story of Mrs Poole I thought was phenomenal writing maintaining the story and keeping it intact to the previous two. There was also a lot of little shots and dialog bits that played homage to the original two which I didn't mind since it was overloaded with them. What gives this movie an average five rating is a weak ending which I thought could have been scripted better. All and all its a solid addition to the Psycho franchise.