Norman Bates is now married to a young nurse named Connie and is expecting a child. However, Norman fears that the child will inherit his mental illness.
What we have here is essentially a sequel & prequel in one. With Norman Bates telling the story of his childhood to a radio station doing a story on matricide (the act of killing one’s mother) and his fears for the unborn child he is due to have.
We finally get to witness the acts of Norma Bates and why Norman is the way he is. It’s cringing and sometimes hard to watch but it does explain a-lot. The scenes are so close to incest it’s unreal but it’s essential story-telling and certainly makes you ponder on how he ever had some sanity left in him.
The film does have some plot-holes but don’t focus on them as this a fantastic film. With a mixture of the past and present we see how Norman is slowly going back to his insane ways under the stress of fear that his child will turn out like he has. With the flashback sequences whilst telling his story to the radio host he confronts his past and confesses that he is planning on killing his pregnant wife.
Henry Thomas does a fantastic job of playing a young Norman Bates, he obviously studied the character very well and pulls it off amazingly. Also Olivia Hussey does a great job of playing the psychotic mother, she got a-lot of criticism which I feel wasn’t needed, in my opinion she was even crazier than we all expected and she pulls off the role with such grace.
And then there’s Anthony Perkins, he is truly fantastic as he always was through-out the franchise. Sadly you can see the effects of his AIDS illness (He died 2 years later) but all credit to him for carrying on and putting in an amazing performance.
The film is a great end to the franchise, it was the story we all wanted to know more about. We were left with more questions than answers but it’s always good to have some mystery left.
Miscellaneous facts about the film:
When Norman first calls into the radio show, he says that his name is Ed. Robert Bloch, author of the original novel “Psycho”, based Norman Bates on real-life Wisconsin serial killer and cannibal Ed Gein.
Several different endings were shot to keep the ending secret. Janet Leigh explains this when she introduced the film when it was first broadcast in 1990.
The only one of the Psycho sequels to use Bernard Herrmann’s theme.
The interior of mother’s bedroom is slightly different from the sets in the previous Psycho films. In the film, the room had a bathroom and an extra closet.
The house used for the film was filmed in the Universal Orlando park, then dismantled shortly after filming along with the motel.
Olivia Hussey didn’t have to audition for the role of Norma Bates; she was directly offered the part and immediately said yes when she was asked if she was interested in playing the role.
When filming the first murder scene, Henry Thomas got so involved in the stabbing that part of the knife went into his hand which caused some nerve damage. To this day he still has a scar.
The scene where Norman rips the apple in half was improvised by Anthony Perkins. In the script, Norman was originally supposed to take a butcher knife and slam it into the apple but Perkins felt that was too corny.
Anthony Perkins and Psycho III screenwriter Charles Edward Pogue originally pitched an idea for Psycho IV that had Norman’s house and motel getting turned into a tourist attraction for horror weekends. Norman then escapes from the mental institution with a mute patient and the actor who was set to play Norman Bates for the horror weekend quits and Norman comes home and gets hired to play himself. Pogue claims that it was meant to be a black comedy but Universal opposed the idea.
The only sequel in the Psycho series not to feature clips from the infamous “shower scene” from the original.
When Anthony Perkins saw the first screening of the film, he called it the best out of all the Psycho sequels.
When screenwriter Joseph Stefano began writing this film, he ignored the Mrs. Spool story arc established in the two previous films and mainly used the first film as the source material.
During pre-production, there were talks of the flashbacks to Norman’s youth being filmed in black and white to reference the original film.
After the film aired on Showtime, there were rumors going around that a fifth film was in development that would focus on Norman’s new born son. However none of these rumors were true and another Psycho film wouldn’t be released until 1998 with Gus Van Sant’s remake.
