The name of the movie and the associated novel seem a bit strange when you consider the content of the novel. In the novel on which the movie is based, there is nothing to do with a postman, and there is no ringing of the bell or something similar. The name is seemingly more to do with the attempt of the author to find a great name for the book (and was seemingly derived from the fact that the postman would ring the bell twice to ensure that there was no doubt that the bell had been rung and the person would come to do the door; this was seemingly also based on the fact that the author was a struggling author whose manuscript had been rejected by 13 publishers, and he would wait for the postman to get the results). In the film, the title is used as a philosophical note in the end, when, sentenced to death for a murder he did not commit, after having escaped any punishment for the murder that he did commit, the protagonist reflects that the second ringing of the bell by the postman was meant to signify that you will eventually get punishment, if not by the first ringing of the bell, then by the second. The movie was directed by Tay Garnett

The book that the movie was based was called the same name ‘The postman always rings twice’ (published in 1934), written by James M Cain, and the fast paced and racy action (including the depiction of violence inspired by sexuality and adultery) was such that the book was banned in some locations. The book, however, is seen as a great crime novel of the 20th century, leading to this movie (with additional movies on the same theme down the years). The 1946 movie, starring Lana Turner, John Garfield, and Cecil Kellaway, is now seen as a film noir.
The movie is based on a story of a triangle of love, lust, deceit, ambition, and violence (the typical strong human emotions that cause all the problems in life). A drifter, Frank Chambers (John Garfield), stops at a local food diner, and then decides to work over there. The diner is being run by a couple, with the husband Nick (Cecil Kellaway) much older than the wife Cora Smith (Lana Turner). Cora is not in love with her husband, and soon she and Frank are having a sexual relationship, an adulterous relationship. She convinces Frank that she is being mistreated by Nick, and soon they decide to murder Nick in such a way that there is no suspicion on them, as well as Cora gets to own the diner.
Their first attempt fails, when they try to show that Nick drowned in his bathtub, but they are unsuccessful, and are only saved when Nick does not remember what happened. Their second attempt to simulate a car crash is more successful, and Nick does indeed die, seemingly a drunk driving accident where Frank and Cora are injured. Not enough evidence lies to tie them to the murder, and even though the prosecutor tries to play them one against the other (by only trying Cora and getting her to try and confess), they are let off with Cora getting a suspended sentence.
Freed from any possible legal punishment, Cora and Frank get together and plan a life with each other, when the irony of the movie exhibits its full face. Cora dies in a car accident, and it is made to seem that Frank is behind this action; he is prosecuted and sentenced to death for this crime. He is incredulous, he is totally innocent; however, as his execution approaches, he is convinced that it is his punishment for his earlier murder (and Cora dying in the car accident was her punishment).

The death penalty has always been controversial, the debate over whether society and laws have the moral and ethical right to take another person’s life. There are a large number of countries where the death penalty no longer exists, with the major nations where the death penalty still holds being Russia, China, India, United States, Iran, Saudi Arabia (and other Islamic countries), Singapore, etc. In the United States, the debate has been a long one, with many people being strong proponents of the death penalty, and others arguing against it (this is getting more heated now that DNA testing is revealing wrongful convictions, link to Innocence Project).
Dead Man Walking is based on a book of the same name by Sister Helen Prejean, a Roman Catholic nun, a passionate advocate of abolition of the death penalty in the US. The title of the book and the movie comes from the traditional saying by guards walking the condemned man to his execution, “Dead man walking, dead man walking here”.

The movie (directed by Tim Robbins) won great critical acclaim, and was nominated for a number of Academy Awards. It deals with the story of Matthew Poncele (played by Sean Penn - and based on 2 different characters whom Sister Helen Prejean counselled, both of whom were on death row. In the movie, Matthew has been in prison for 6 years now, awaiting his execution for the crime of having killed a teenage couple (after having raped the girl); his accomplice Vitello was sentenced to a lighter prison sentence due to a better lawyer.
Matthew appeals to the Sister to help him in his final appeal; and he is not the image of a repentant person - instead he comes across as both arrogant and sexist, and with not the slightest tinge of remorse. Instead he claims to be innocent. While visiting him over a period of time, she gets to know his mother, as well as the family members of his victims (who cannot understand her motives for trying to save a convicted murderer). Poncele does not get remission, his appeal for denial of execution is denied, and his date for death is set. Sister Prejean will finally hope to save his soul, for him to confess his deeds. In the end, Matthew does indeed do so, confessing his crimes and pleading for forgiveness from the family members of his victims (just before his execution).

Oscars:
Susan Sarandon won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role.
Sean Penn was nominated for Best Actor in a Leading Role
Tim Robbins was nominated for Best Director
Main track, “Dead Man Walkin” by Bruce Springsteen nominated for Best Song

Mighty strange name for a movie, and one would wonder about what the name means .. the name actually is meant to represent ‘death’, as in the final sleep. In 1939, Raymond Chandler wrote a book where he created the famous detective persona of Philip Marlowe, and set it against a mystery involving deception, revenge, many people betraying each other, and an overall complex story line. It was but natural for such a story to be made into a movie, and this piece of fiction was made into 2 movies, one made in 1945, and the other made in 1978. The movie, released in 1946, starred the famous stars, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall as the lead stars. It is tough to make such a complex case (so complex that even the author apparently left one murder in the story unsolved), and this effort was done by Director Howard Hawks, with screenplay by William Faulkner.

One story about the filming that portrays the complication of the story was that when the Director was unable to figure out as to who killed the chauffeur Owen Taylor, he sent a note to the author Chandler, and Chandler could not figure out either. By the time of the movie release, the ’story’ of Bogart and Bacall was in full flow, and Bacall’s agent wanted to get more screen presence of Bacall in the movie, and new scenes were added for this purpose. And of course, this also meant that scenes of Martha Vickers (Carmen) were cut in order to give more significance to Bacall. Another interesting point was that the novel had to be censored to fit into the production mores that were in force in Hollywood at that time.
The movie is about the investigation by Private Detective Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) of a case given to him by General Sternwood (Charles Waldron). The General wants him to resolve some gambling debts owed by his younger daughter Carmen (Martha Vickers) to a bookseller called Arthur Geiger. In this visit, Carmen tries to flirt with Philip, but he remains indifferent to her. He also meets the General’s recently divorced older daughter, Mrs. Vivian Rutlidge (Lauren Bacall). And Philip plunges headlong into a mystery involving nymphomania, pornography, murder, deceit. At the center of all this is Carmen, and involves the murder of Geiger. In the end, after some murders, a lot of violence, eventually he is able to learn the true facts of the case and figure out what to tell the police.

Some Like It Hot, a movie released in 1959 and starring Marilyn Monroe, has been acknowledged to be one of the top 10 movie comedies of all time, with the American Film Institute calling the movie as the greatest American comedy film of all time. The movie stars Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon as 2 men on the run from gangsters (having witnessed a massacre), and using the guise of women to try and get away from the gangsters. In between, they meet Marilyn and fall for her, while a very rich man falls for one of them (in his disguise as a woman).
The movie was directed by Billy Wilder, and was adapted from a story written by Robert Thoeren and Michael Logan. The same story with some differences had already been used in a German movie called ‘Fanfaren der Liebe’ (made 8 years ago in 1951).

The movie was condemned by religious groups (with the Catholic Legion of Decency criticizing the movie). For a number of decades, Hollywood had been under a Production Code (that covered the morals of movies). It was on its way out, and this movie was one of the movies that contributed to its passing, released after not having received an MPAA logo. The movie was received well, and nominated for 6 Oscars. It won one Award, Best Costume Design, Black-and-White (Orry-Kelly).
The movie is about these 2 struggling musicians, who are trying to escape Chicago after seeing a mob maasacre. However, it is difficult to find a job, and they find that the only out of town job they can get is 2 positions in a All Girls Band that is going to Florida. They join in, dressing as woman (and this is part of the reason why the movie was made as a Black and White movie, since the makeup to make them look like woman was not letting the movie look good in color); and calling themselves Josephine and Geraldine (later changed to Daphne). Soon, they also find themselves head-over-heels for the vocalist and ukulele player, “Sugar Kane” (Marilyn Monroe). It is a bit difficult to express your emotions openly when you are dressing as a woman, so that part is a struggle for them.
Joe becomes enterprising, taking on the role of a millionaire and romancing Sugar in that role; it is Jerry who gets into more trouble. An actual millionaire, Osgood Fielding III, falls for his female disguise, and Jerry plays along in the hope of making some money from this transaction. And then the finale, where the gangsters arrive at the hotel for a conference, and spot these 2. They run from the mobsters, finally reaching the yacht of the millionaire, where the drama continues to happen. Sugar reveals that she has fallen for Joe, and to Jerry’s horror, Osgood keeps pursuing him, right to the end when Jerry reveals that he is a man, a very famous line is spoken by Osgood, “Well, nobody’s perfect.”

Agatha Christie (Wikipedia) was one of the most prolific writers in the detective genre and created two most unlikely characters in the form of detectives. Till then, the character of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes defined the character of the detective - a man who is exceedingly smart and knows it, but is not very vain, and who can be urged to great action when he needs to, also a man of great physical strength (even if his frame does not suggest it). Both the characters created by Agatha Christie were very different, with Miss Marple being a frail old lady, but with a terrific mind and ability to think through things (most of which occur in her village) even when she is engrossed in daily routine manners, and then the other character who is the central character of this novel, the egg shaped Belgian detective Hercule Poirot.
A vain man, who knows that he is very smart, and is not above telling other people about this. He is obsessed with things being proper, making sure that his mustache is well maintained and becomes uncomfortable when he finds out that people do not know about him. At the same time, he is very capable, like Sherlock Holmes, of putting facts together, and of being able to find the discrepancies that help him crack the crime. Hercule Poirot was introduced by Agatha Christie in 1920 in ‘The Mysterious Affair at Styles’ and appeared in 33 of Christie’s novels and 54 short stories.

The story has a twist in the end, when Hercule Poirot actually presents 2 different options as to who did the murder, and presents it in such a way that the decision will eventually go only one way. The novel is set on the Orient Express, near Belgrade. Poirot is returning from a case in Syria, and gets a berth on the Orient Express with difficult, due to the help of his friend Monsieur Bouc, a director of the company which operates the Express. He meets a number of people on the train (and is very surprised at the fact that it is full, something very unlikely at this time of the year). He also meets a man who exudes violence, Mr. Ratchett, who asks him to act as his defender from people out to get him and Poirot refuses.
On the second night, he hears a noise in the night from the neighboring compartment, occupied by Mr. Ratchett. After some time, the conductor is called by Mrs. Hubbard who is terrified that somebody is in her coach. There is some further commotion, but then he sleeps. When he gets back, he is notified that the train will not move further since it is stuck in a snowdrift, and also learns that Mr. Ratchett has been murdered during the night, struck multiple times with a knife; and Poirot is the one called on for help.
After some investigation, Poirot discovers that Mr. Ratchett was actually a leader of a criminal gang and his real name was Cassetti. He was the chief leader of the plot to abduct the rich heiress Daisy Armstrong, and she was then murdered inspite of the ransom having been paid by her parents. Both her parents died subsequently, her mother in grief which induced an early childbirth and she died, her father shooting himself. It also caused suspicion in other house members such as the maid who was suspected and who killed herself because of this suspicion.
Poirot finds that the clues and events of the night are set in such a manner that every person has an alibi, sometimes from unexpected resources; and eventually starts to think in a holistic sense, trying out a theory that the other members of the investigating party (the official and the doctor) are unable to think through. Finally, through some conjecture (and this was the weak link in the book - everything seemed to settle through easily), he is able to deduce the actual facts and the names of the murderer(s). He then presents this theory, as well as an alternative theory to the other members of the team, and asks them to pick the one that they prefer. What choice do they make of the theory to present to the Yugoslav police when they will reach there ?

Robert Ludlum wrote a lot about conspiracies of power and attempting to take control, a subject that was very popular in the 60’s and 70’s with all the talk of the rise of the arms-industrial complex and associated industries; the good part is that he was able to weave a good storyline that kept a person compelled to read the book. Ludlum’s books had many things in common, they had a fast paced action, they always had many top level people involved, including surprises where some of the people were not expected to be a part of the conspiracy, but they were.
The Materese Circle involves 2 brutal and skilled enemies, Vasili Taleniekov from the Soviet Union, and Brandon Alan Scofield from the US State Dept Consular Relations. These 2 are killers who have killed people loved by either one of them, and hate each other in a visceral way. And they are the 2 main suspects from either side when valuable people on tne US (the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) and Soviet (a very renowned scientist) side are assassinated in a brutal way. Suspicion immediately falls onto the other, and is only neautralized when the leaders of either countries calls the other.

Both of these are killers are now getting slightly old, maybe not of so much use to their country’s intelligence community, but still have the talent. However, little do they know about the way that their life is going to be turned. They are soon going to be getting information about a massive conspiracy, called the Materese Circle, spun by an old Corsican rich man and coming to full active life now. The conspiracy has its own troops, its own assassins and its own leaders, and they will stop at nothing to remove the ones they want to remove from their path. The Materese leaders are the ones who are orchestrating the international terrorism community (one must remember this was before the time of the Al-Qaeda), and is now moving towards getting control of both Moscow and Washington DC, and it is very difficult to stop them.
Taleniekov learns of these facts from an old friend who is dying after a visit from a killer of the Matarese Circle, and finds it hard to believe all this conspiracy, and when told to work with Scofield, refuses; but soon things are moving to get them together. Both these skilled killers are, under instructions from Matarese Men, sentenced to death by their respective Governments, no capture, no interrogation, just execution. Eventually, these 2 old enemies, get together (in an incredible episode of violence where they manage to kill the assassins sent to kill them). They travel to the Island of Corsica to learn more, and learn a fair deal more about the origins of the group called the Matarese. They are pursued relentlessly by the Matarese, who don’t hesitate to kill friends and loved ones of these 2.
At the same time, these 2 are getting closer to the source, and eventually manage to reach their target, and in a final burst of violence, manage to eliminate the Matarese council, even as the Soviet is lost in this final carnage. Read the book for its fast paced flow, for the story that could seem realistic in a different time and that is very gripping.

Reading novels from Nobel Literature winners is not my cup of tea. So, when a friend suggested “My Name Is Red” to me, I was apprehensive to start. After all, it is written by Orhan Pamuk, Turkish writer and winner of Nobel Prize in Literature 2006 for his novel titled “Snow”. My Name Is Red was written much earlier (in 2001) but still it would be an effort to read it - so as I thought. And, I was indeed correct. It is not effortless reading but it is surely worthwhile.

In general, Orhan Pamuk has been vocal about freedom of expression issues. In year 2005, he was forced to flee from his country due to the hate campaigns against him after he made a statement regarding the mass killings of Armenians and Kurds in Antolia. There were criminal charges brought against him for these remarks but they were subsequently dropped. I have earlier read some part of his Nobel lecture and his thoughts touched me a lot. An excerpt from his Nobel lecture is as follows (translation by Maureen Freely) :-
What literature needs most to tell and investigate today are humanity’s basic fears: the fear of being left outside, and the fear of counting for nothing, and the feelings of worthlessness that come with such fears; the collective humiliations, vulnerabilities, slights, grievances, sensitivities, and imagined insults, and the nationalist boasts and inflations that are their next of kind … Whenever I am confronted by such sentiments, and by the irrational, overstated language in which they are usually expressed, I know they touch on a darkness inside me. We have often witnessed peoples, societies and nations outside the Western world–and I can identify with them easily–succumbing to fears that sometimes lead them to commit stupidities, all because of their fears of humiliation and their sensitivities. I also know that in the West–a world with which I can identify with the same ease–nations and peoples taking an excessive pride in their wealth, and in their having brought us the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, and Modernism, have, from time to time, succumbed to a self-satisfaction that is almost as stupid.

My Name Is Red is a kind of murder mystery set in 1591, when the murder of Elegant Effendi, a painter in the Ottoman Empire, threatens to expose a blasphemy that has infected Ottoman court painters. It is rumored that a secret book commissioned by the sultan is dedicated to European artistic styles, which favours figurative arts (prohibited in Islam). Four miniaturists, under the guidance of a rival to the sultan, have been painting it secretly. Consumed by guilt, Elegant confesses one evening, inciting someone to murder him. The clue to which miniaturist murdered him hinges upon the nostrils of a horse: In a drawing found on the dead man’s body, these nostrils displayed a distinct style. This story of the sultan’s secret book and the murder is told in the first person from the point of view of various narrators, not all of them human. So we hear from the corpse, the lovers and the murderer, a gold coin, the color red, and many more. The characters talk with the reader directly, and nearly each chapter has its own narrator starting with the murdered painter himself in the first chapter.

Wonderfully written book.

“Men Who Killed Gandhi” was first published in 1978. It is like a research work by the author where he tries to unearth the facts about Gandhi’s assassination. Recently, the book has been released with new documents, and rare pictures that leave the readers amused. Interesting archival records include copies of the Air-India tickets used by Godse and Apte to make the trip from Bombay to Delhi and back for the assassination and even their bills at Hotel Marina in Connaught Place where they stayed while carrying out their mission.

It is an informative book about historical facts but it reads like a thriller about a well-laid murder plan. It traces the whole events (partition of India, riots, Gandhi’s fast) leading to the assassination and the trial at Red Fort afterwards. The book tries not to take a side at all – which is a good thing provided the fact that neither of them (Gandhi or Godse) was justified. If Gandhi was not justified to go on hunger strike for releasing 55 crores to Pakistan while India was at war with them, Godse was equally not justified to kill somebody (and that somebody in this case was Mahatma Gandhi). The book states that both Godse and Apte were pledged to the cause of an independent and undivided India. And they held Gandhi liable for India’s division.

The book also points out the leniency with which police handled the events leading to Gandhi’s murder (including a failed bomb attack only two weeks ago). As per the author, if the police would have been fast enough (and would have cut through their internal egos/red-tapism) they would have surely caught all these persons earlier enough to avoid the assassination. On the other hand, book also points out the childish ways of the murders and their co-accused, how on each step they left some witnesses behind to identify them and bring them to justice. It also points out that how Gandhi was all together alienated from the realities of divided India and public sentiments during last days of his life – and paid with his life for that.

The US military involvement in Vietnam was an experience that even decades later is recalled as a phase to avoid. Every military engagement by the US is vetted to see that the US should not get involved the same way that it got involved in Vietnam. The US military had a humiliating defeat when it was forced to retreat from Vietnam, and did not get its true spirit back till the defeat of Saddam Hussain in the First Gulf Way in 1991. The US dogma (including any required military effort) to beat back the ascendancy of Communism around the world is seen as the primary reason for the involvement in the Vietnam War. Given the impact of the Vietnam War on the US psyche during the 1970’s and after, it was natural to expect many many movies to be made on the subject, and some great movies have been made.

Some of the movies have been ‘Good morning Vietnam’, ‘Apocalypse Now’, ‘The Deer Hunter’, ‘Full Metal Jacket’, ‘Forrest Gump’, etc. A lot of these movies have been dark movies, such as ‘Apocalypse Now’, a very dark portrayal of the madness of war and what such a war does to the people involved. Similarly, Platoon is a dark depiction of war, of the changes wrought in the innocent young men who went to war, and whom the war turned into cynical, moody and mentally wrought people. A whole generation of young men were taken from their families, drafted into the war, and turned into hard, battle weary men. Platoon takes a glimpse of what war life must be for a few of these young men. Oliver Stone, who served as an American soldier in war, takes his experiences and creates his most famous and acclaimed movie. This is the movie that made Stone’s reputation.
The movie made an equally good impression on a large section of the critics, and also got a good share of the Oscars, winning 4, and getting nominated for others.
Won: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Film Editing, and Best Sound
Nominated: Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Tom Berenger), Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Willem Dafoe), Best Cinematography and Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen.
At the time of release, the Vietnam War had been over for more than a decade, and a new generation of Americans were not so aware of the mood of the country in the late 60’s and 70’s. At such a time, the release of such a movie that portrayed the war as a brutal war that sapped the human spirit, and portrayed the impact on individual members of the platoon would have been akin to a shocking reminder of what the war must have been like. In addition, the movie did not present things in stark black and white, with a large amount of moral ambiguity through the movie. Even the protagonist, a person who does not sway too much from the right side, eventually kills in cold blood, not during a conflict, and out of hate. Further, the depiction of the massacre in a village, modeled after the ‘My Lai’ village massacre during the Vietnam War is meant to shock.
The movie takes Chris Taylor (Charlie Sheen), a young upper middle-class American dropping out of college to join the war because he feels that there is an unfair policy where rich kids are getting deferment to join the war because of their education, while poorer background young men are being sent to join the war. However, any romanticism of the war is soon lost in the actual combat zone, whether due to the mundaneness of digging foxholes or in an actual conflict situation (where a fellow soldier dies in the cross-fire). The movie also shows the contrasting impact of the war on people with the depiction of 2 Sergeants, Sgt. Elias and Staff Sgt. Barnes. Elias (William Dafoe in an Oscar nominated role) is a squad leader who has not been corrupted by the war and maintains his essential humanity. He almost dies a death at the hands of his own countrymen when he is shot by Barnes (Tom Berenger) in the middle of battle, eventually being killed by the Vietnamese while fleeing from them in a wounded state. Barnes himself is shot by Taylor after a major combat action in revenge for the killing of Elias. Barnes is an example of what human being can become who cracks under the pressure of war and goes to the dark side. Another major highlight of the movie is the dependence of soldiers on good leadership with the platoon having an inept leadership in the form of Lt. Wolfe (apparently Lt. Wolfe is used in US army training as an example of how not to command).

Psycho (released in 1960) was arguably Alfred Hitchcock’s most famous movie, and acknowledged as one of the best movies of all times. The movie set new standards in the field of horror movies, something that slasher movies later have found it difficult to emulate. This was also a movie that Alfred Hitchcock wanted to use to establish his reputation, especially when ‘Vertigo’ had failed 2 years earlier (neither the critics nor the audience gave it much of a reception); and the story of a murderer (a novel by Peter Bloch) was something that appealed to him. He had not made such a movie in the past, although he had made his name in suspense, and the making of a movie of the genre of a psychotic murderer would be a different movie.

To that extent, the story of Psycho was something that Hitchcock guarded to a very high degree. Even the film rights to the novel were bought under a different name so that viewers would not guess the twists in the story. This quest for secrecy manifested itself in several different ways. Hitchcock forbade most promotion on the usual media - television, radio, and print interviews so that there was no fear of revealing the truth. In addition, critics were not allowed the usual private screenings, but had to see the movie with the general public, so that the plot remained secret (even though preventing the critics from their screenings might cause reviews to be not so positive).
The movie also struggled on a different front. The studio for which Hitchcock was supposed to make another movie, Paramount, was not happy with the script or with the thought of Hitchcock making this movie. They did not believe that the script was suitable for a movie, and in fact, such a movie was essentially a pet peeve for Hitchcock. Accordingly, his usual budget was denied, causing Hitchcock to raise money on his own and cut costs. He hired his regular staff, managed to get the lead star Janet Leigh for much less than her regular fee; the overall budget was less than a million dollars.
The movie was reviewed poorly by critics, but turned out to be a major commercial success, earning some $32 million overall. Since the movie was produced by Hitchcock’s company, his share of the profits was much greater than one would have expected otherwise. The success of the movie led critics to change their views, do a re-review, and the movie earned a total of 4 Oscar nominations.
The movie is a gripping psycho drama, with a shower murder scene that is one of the most famous scenes ever; this scene has been copied and parodied many times. There has been countless research done over the decades to evaluate as to why the scene has had such an impact to users; as an aside, it has been popular lore that the scene impacted the actress Janet Leigh so much that she found it difficult to take a shower after that.
The movie is set in a out-of-the-way motel called Bates motel. It is run by the young man called Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) who lives with his ailing mother. And who arrives to this motel ? The lady on the run, Marion Crane (Janet Leigh). She is in love with Sam Loomis (John Gavin), but both of them do not have much money. They are in dire need of money since Sam is in debt and also has alimony payments to an wx-wife that are ongoing. Marion steals $40,000 from the office in Phoenix, Arizona that she works in (she is asked to deposit the money in the bank, but she runs off with the money), and wants to drive to the town in California where Sam works.
She is suspicious, wondering about whether the police is after her; in this state, she even changes her car to try to throw pursuers off her track. In this state, she finds a motel on the way, and is persuaded to stay there. She finds Norman Bates a bit strange, but nothing prepares her for her end. When she is showering in her motel room, an apparently elderly woman attacks her and is stabbed to death (with a powerful musical score playing in the background).
Norman finds the corpse of Marion, and in order to protect his mother, he dumps Marion and all her belongings (including the car) into a nearby swamp. However, it is not the end; a private detective Milton Arbogast (Martin Balsam) is hired to find Norman. He manages to find the Bates motel, and starts to question Norman who gets all nervous. He meets the same end as Marion, being slashed to death by Norman’s mother after being pushed down the stairs. When Milton does not report back, Marion’s mother Lila and Sam get concerned and contact the sheriff. When the sheriff is told about Norman’s mother, he is surprised since Norman’s mother had died 10 years back.
Sam and Lila investigate further, and slip into the motel. They find a slip of paper talking about the money that Marion was carrying ($40,000), and so decide to confront Norman’s mother. Lila is tasked with talking to the mother, while Sam would divert Norman. However, Norman soon has a fight with Sam and knocks him out; Lila is shocked when she discovers the preserved body of Norman’s mother; and the secret is out - Norman is wearing his mother’s clothes when he comes with a knife to kill Lila. Sam arrives just in time and knocks Norman out.
In the end, a psychiatrist explains the truth; Norman and his mother lived together with no one else. So when Norman’s mother took a lover, Norman killed them both, and then tried to erase the guilt by preserving her body, and acting as her (in a classic case of split personality). In this reverse state, the split personality is jealous of any woman to whom Norman comes in touch with, and kills such a women. His psychosis prevents him from realizing the enormity of his crimes. Norman lands up in a cell, his mind dominated by his mother. In this alter ego, she believes that she is harmless and Normal is responsible for her current state.