Psycho or Les Diaboliques?

"Most definitely Les Diaboliques. Psycho was great but disappointing... And LD did more than make up for that disappointment"


I also prefer Les Diaboliques for a couple of reasons.
But imho Psycho is a fabulous picture as well.
I've never heard anyone say they were 'disappointed' by Psycho.
Why do you say that?

I love both, but i perfer Les Diaboliques better. excellent twist, great story, and great acting. I also liked it b/c to me there was an overwhelming sense of dread.


I kick ass for the lord!!

i am a die-hard hitchcok fan....so i decided to watch this to see what he was competing against

major spoilers ahead
before i compare both i admit that both the twists were spoiled to me (damn those stupid movie shows)

now i gave both a 10/10

now in terms of build-up to the climax and the climax itself i have to admit Les Diaboliques clinches the victory...yes its a more scarier climax and this statement comes from a hitchcok fan

but as an overall movie psycho outsmarts it not near the end but at a half-way through ,, marion crane is sympathized and we begin to travel with and when she's murdered i got to say its possibly the most iconic shift i ever saw in a movie ..thats were psycho shines, ie more shocking instead of scaring..

and also psycho examines much stonger dark subjects like voyeurism,guilt more complexy than diaboliques...and also some more iconic shots like shower scene,the climax mother scence, also the score (never thought violins to be so cynical), Anthony Pekins brilliant performance ,makes psycho more classic
though diaboliques wins as a better suspense movie ,
overall as a complete package psycho wins,


but both are masterpieces -in the end cinema was truly benefited due to such a competition between the makers


click this
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0048473/

Psycho all the way. I couldn't get into Diabolique at all.

I don't think they're even comparable.
Psycho by a very wide margin.

Les Diaboliques is just a well-executed, admittedly creepy mystery film.
Whereas Psycho is a searching examination of guilt, loneliness, sexual repression among other things. Norman Bates, to my mind, is one of the great cinematic creations. Just as important to cinema as Hamlet or Othello are to literature.

I could repeatedly watch Psycho just for the opening guilt ridden love scene or the office parlour conversation. Those scenes are not even among the film's set pieces. The dialogue in Les Diaboliques is trite and commonplace.

Even as a work of entertainment, Psycho comes ahead. It's got more big moments. Both the murders are genuinely shocking on first viewing if the audience hasn't read about it in advance. And yes, Vera Miles' "exploration" of the Bates mansion is just as suspenseful and lasts longer than Vera Clouzot's nightmarish walk at the end of LD. And ofcourse, Psycho can boast of one of the all-time great scores. It's also the work of a genuine auteur. Hitchcock's signature montage-driven visual style is stamped all over it. Les Diaboliques, on the other hand, relies more heavily on words and less on images.

I think this tendency to elevate Les Diaboliques is typical of those who're enamoured by "continental" films and dismissive of commercial Hollywood cinema made closer home. I wouldn't even rate Les Diaboliques above old 40s Hollywood thrillers like Lang's Woman in the Window or Tourneur's Cat People

I know a lot of people have problems with the psychologist's "babble" at the end of Psycho. I don't. I think it was Hitchcock's way of parodying psychiatrists and also those who buy into such elaborate "explanations". I remember Vera Miles giving Simon Oakland a rather quizzical, "I'm tired of your babble" kind of look during his talk :)

I think the climax gives Psycho the much needed dose of humour. Otherwise, the film would've seemed way too gruesome.

Method Actors give you a photograph, Real actors an Oil Painting
Charles Laughton

I prefer Psycho, but I think that Les Diboliques is the better film. I think the plot is better and some complain about the pacing, but I think for this film it could be no other way. It was maddening to watch, waiting, for the other shoe to drop exactly where I knew it would in Les Diaboliques. However, if you can for a moment imagine what it would have been like for, Christina a woman with a heart condition and a guilty conscience then you can understand why the film was paced the way it was and why it had to be that way. Also, the film showed a lot of people that were just not nice at all and there were no real heroes, so it was slow and without people with redeeming qualities. So, even though I didn't enjoy it, I would say that it's value as a story is quite high and the way it was carried out was nearly perfect. Psycho on the other was more enjoyable to watch as at least two characters were likable, it was faster paced, it was in English so I didn't have to strain to see difficult to read subtitles. I feel the acting was slightly better than the French film. But, on the other hand Psycho wasn't as good a in character development and the story line wasn't quite as good. The build up wasn't as carefully constructed either.

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