Psyco

Psycho by Alfred Hitchcock.
The story line of psycho shows us a woman called Marion running away with money that she stole as she is fed up of her life. She wants to get married to her new lover called Sam who she cannot marry as he has to pay out all of his money away in alimony. This is the maguffin as it is part of the story but it isn't the most important or recognized part of the film.
The main part of the story is where Marion decides to stay at The Bates Motel where she is killed by Mrs Bates who we later find out is Mr Bates dressed up as his dead mother.
This film starts with a red herring straight away as we are initially let to believe that the story is about Marion stealing the money and showing her escape and bring the money to Sam to start their new lives. It doesn't look like a thriller when the film begins.

In this film there is a lot of suspense as the audience know there will be a murder but they do not know how or when it will occur.

Thrillers are known for their fast paced and frequent action, the car shower scene is a good example of this.

In Psycho there is no hero, there is just a villain who is unsuspected throughout the whole film, during the film the dead mother is the suspected villain who no body ever sees. Hitchcock chose Norman Bates as the villain as he wanted to avoid cliche and chose an unlikely villain living in the most unlikely of places. There are many different devices used in this film such as multiple Red Herrings an example of this is the shower scene and the final revelation about the mother, who is really Norman. The viewer would be shocked the first time they see the film as they expect Marion to be the main character throughout the scene and do not expect her early departure. When Marion is killed it is apparent that the main character is actually Norman Bates, this seemed strange early on in the film as Mr. Bates seemed an uninteresting character but suspicion builds as the story line continues.

Suspense is built up in the film by using long terms of low paced action and low level violence shown on screen so the audience are always expecting something to happen. Psycho is a very villain driven plot as much of the film is trying to figure out who the real villain is, at first it seems to be the mother but as the film progresses we finally realize that the villain is actually Mr Bates.