Norman Bates is back! As a woman is hosting a radio show with the subject of boys murdering their mothers, a man calling himself Ed calls in and begin telling his story. But a doctor who examined Bates after the first murders recognize him and it turns out it's the old, psychotic… More
Norman Bates is back! As a woman is hosting a radio show with the subject of boys murdering their mothers, a man calling himself Ed calls in and begin telling his story. But a doctor who examined Bates after the first murders recognize him and it turns out it's the old, psychotic killer who used to dress up as his mother and kill young, innocent women - and he's planning to do it again...
Not much of a sequel, but a flashback drama where we're allowed to experience Norman's childhood and the events that led to killing spree. It's mostly about his obnoxious mother harassing him, and turning his life into a living hell. The modern Norman calls her both good and bad, but we're almost only allowed to see her bad sides. She's not some evil psycho, like we've thought before, but just an annoying bitch.
We get to see some of Norman's murders before the whole mom-plot kicks in, and that goes on until the climax. People expecting some paranoia horror or gory murders will be hugely disappointed - this film is made only to explain the previous movies, not following them. And it's interesting, for a while, but as soon as we've learned that Norman's dislikable mom was the sole reason the film gets stuck and never gets anywhere. We know he's about to poison the mother and her slimy lover, but it takes extremely long before we get there and that particular scene is mostly a big "so?", and annoyingly changing several details made clear in Psycho II.
The film begins well though, and Anthony Perkins reprise of Norman is good even though he spends most of the time talking on the phone in a kitchen. He doesn't get some action until the goofy climax where he chases his wife (yes, somehow he has a wife) through a house in tired slasher-formula clichés. His wife, who's apparently a psychologist, has to be the dumbest shrink in a movie ever. Well, back to the movie. Rounding out the cast are cast-against-type Henry Thomas (the boy in E.T.) as young Norman and Olivia Hussey (the heroine of Black Christmas) as the mother. Both tries their best but have unevenly written roles. Thomas, who also resembles a young Perkins, successfully imitates Norman's behavior but it's never given any transformation into the psycho he abruptly becomes. Hussey manages to create a very nasty character, but it's not the woman we expected after seeing the original film.
This so-called sequel isn't the turkey it could have become, but it's also not the clever follow-up it should have been. It has great intentions and holds a good plot but the feeling of it is just tired and bitter, as the director (Mick Garris, who later made the dreadful The Shining mini-series remake) didn't get a grip of the film and just gave up. This could have worked with a better script and more intense direction, but the result is ultimately forgettable.
For a TV movie this is surprisingly gory but the murder scenes look cheap and are badly made. Hitchcock was smart enough to never show the actual
stabbings, but here we see the knives stabbing the victims and it's embarrassingly obvious fake. When Norman's haunted by one of the victims, with a knife in her shoulder, it looks like a toy.
This opens terrifically with Bernard Herrmann's original 1960 score, which one of the best -and most famous - horror film scores. It's used often in the film, in the murder scenes mostly notable, but the music switches on to dull,
typical TV film score after a while.
If you're dying to get the background story to Norman Bates, you might wanna watch this but otherwise this movie hasn't much to offer, even
if it's not all-bad. Good performances, though not good enough to save a lame film.
