Paycho* (for Psycho)

When anyone asks me what my favorite movie is, I always say I'm torn between Pinocchio (Disney, 1940) and Psycho (Hitchcock, 1960). It's not necessarily true as I don't have "A" favorite movie, but I truly do love both. Psycho of course, has that great shower scene with its 77 different camera angles of Marion Crane getting stabbed. Pinocchio, on the other hand, has an amazing tracking shot that starts up in the steeples of the town and pans down through the street ending up on Gepetto's front stoop - incredible multi-plane camera work. Both scenes are brilliantly conceived and executed.

Psycho has so many great quotable lines - "He was flirting with you...I guess he must have noticed my wedding ring." I love that one! But how many times I have quoted Pinocchio's Honest John - "Ah, school...what would this stupid world be without it?" (That was a hypothetical, I have no idea many times, but it's been a lot.)

Psycho is SO scary! The end with Lila pondering going down to the basement! Yikes! On the other hand Pinocchio has that scene of Lampwick, the bad little boy on Pleasure Island turning into a jackass. Pretty freaky. Of course in this day and age, many people may find neither disturbing, but in their time...

The main characters of both films, Pinocchio and Marion Crane, end up in water; a washing away of their sins, as it were. Unfortunately, while Pinocchio was reborn as a real boy, Marion, well, on to a different life altogether.

What I'm trying to get at is keep your choices and options open, especially if they're completely disparate! "It's the only way to fly!" (Oops, wrong film.)

Paycho* is in the Low Probability section of the Ballard List. Pinocchio, on the other hand, shows up not at all; must be easier to spell.

(The painting, taken from Wikipedia, is Edward Hopper's "The House by the Railroad" which was used as inspiration for the home of Norma Bates and his mother. Edward Hopper and Alfred Hitchcock - that's rather disparate.)