The blood that Norman Bates cried out to his mother about has long since dried. Psycho and The Bates Motel have long been at rest. Alfred Hitchcock’s tremendous stark black-and-white nightmare started a franchise that lead to three subsequent films, a shot-for-shot remake, and a television series. But, in careful and recent rediscovery, I’ve found that Mick Garris’ Psycho IV: The Beginning was easily the best of the lot, next to Hitchcock’s perfect original.

Speaking recently in an episode of Post Mortem with Mick Garris, the director answers several questions about Psycho IV. Those questions range from its early production to actually working with Anthony Perkins. The entire episode is to celebrate the film’s 30th anniversary and is worth a listen if you haven’t already.

Psycho IV was always a genuinely terrifying and disturbing ride. But not for the reasons that Hitchcock’s original was.

Garris’ direction combined with Joseph Stefano script allowed us to be a fly on the wall during Norman’s childhood and the events that lead to Bates becoming Bates as we know him. The terror smartly doesn’t try to repeat itself resting on previous entries; i doesn’t creep out at you from any of the familiar places. Instead, the terror is delivered via memory. A stained memory that in itself drove Norman mad. It dares you to experience that very memory in its runtime. It dares you to not go mad.

Garris and Stefano do this by sharing a traumatic sexual awakening that Norman has while growing up as an isolated, only-child around his mother. Each scene that features loving mother and lonely son, becomes more and more uncomfortable as the film moves. We ultimately have, strange scenes buried under an shaky unease and misguided love, compounded by Mrs. Bates’ bi-polar nature. The combination makes for a powder-keg of emotions and creeping cringe.

All of Norman’s childhood is shared via a late night radio show exploring young men who have killed their mothers. It’s a smart wraparound. It gives a nice canvas to paint on and at no time does any of it feel like a retread of any of the prior Psycho films. It smartly carves its own trail. Most importantly, it doesn’t show how the sausage is made,  sure, we are seeing Norman’s upbringing but Psycho IV never sets out to say “here is why Norman went crazy.” Instead, Garris plays with color and setups to reveal the radius of madness but doesn’t ruin Norman by over explaining or pointing a bloody finger to any sort of explanation overkill.

I also, found it really great to go back and watch a very overlooked Henry Thomas role. Thomas, who plays young Bates, does so with a real vulnerability and a retcon exploration of Anthony Perkins and his approach to Norman Bates. It’s great to have just finished Mike Flanagan’s The Haunting of Bly Manor and to now watch Henry Thomas explore his British Gent of a character and then watch him in his youth as he embodies precocious Bates.

Psycho IV is smart, and worth a revisit and  re-exploration. Garris shoots the hell out of this thing and manages to do things with it that I don’t think would have been touched if placed in other hands.

Psycho IV: The Beginning celebrates its 30th anniversary on Nov. 10.

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