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On Gus Van Sant's 'Psycho' and Other 'Psychos'

Book cover © De Gruyter

Book cover © De Gruyter

Frank Kelleter – 2026

This chapter explores "continuations" of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho, with a particular focus on Van Sant's 1998 remake, which is analyzed as an experiment in media self-reflection that challenges both the concept of the cinematic artwork and the commercial logic of filmic continuation. The first section examines Hollywood's tradition of sequels and remakes, addressing their commercial-aesthetic functions in a production culture that thrives on seriality. The essay describes the specific seriality of Hollywood feature films as a "second-order" form of seriality that shifts seriality's "operational" aesthetic from narrative immersion to media immersion. The second section traces the impact of Hitchcock's Psycho on the horror genre, particularly its influence on the slasher film cycle from the late 1970s through the 1990s. The third section examines the sequels within the Psycho franchise, emphasizing their privileging of storyworld over storytelling, and how this aesthetic turns narrative suspense into an issue of (re)mediation. The fourth section critically engages with Van Sant's 1998 remake, exploring it as an untimely exercise in counterfactual media history, whose "mad" media fetishism prefigures the temporal derangements of digital (or post-cinematic) culture. In sum, the essay examines the interplay between narrative seriality and media seriality in the commercial aesthetics of Hollywood’s modes of continuation.

Title
On Gus Van Sant's 'Psycho' and Other 'Psychos'
Publisher
De Gruyter
Location
Berlin/Boston
Keywords
Book Chapter; RA 3: Future Perfect
Date
2026-01-01
Appeared in
Ulla Haselstein, Florian Sedlmeier (Eds). To Be Continued – Forms of Narrative Continuation (= Buchreihe der Anglia / Anglia Book Series 89)
Type
Text
Size or Duration
292–313
Coverage
This publication is the result of work carried out in Research Area 3: Future Perfect.

How to cite:
Frank Kelleter. "On Gus Van Sant's Psycho and Other Psychos." In To Be Continued – Forms of Narrative Continuation, edited by Ulla Haselstein and Florian Sedlmeier, 292–313. Buchreihe der Anglia / Anglia Book Series 89. Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter, 2026. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783111705651-014.