10 Horror Movie Fakeouts We All Fell For

While it's one of horror cinema's worst-kept secrets these days, you have to respect the ambition of Alfred Hitchcock to execute such a daring audience fakeout way back in 1960.

Though Psycho's marketing made it abundantly clear that Janet Leigh would be starring as protagonist Marion Crane, this was all part of Hitchcock's master plan to catch audiences off-guard.

Just before the film's mid-way point, Marion is suddenly killed off by the knife-wielding killer while taking a shower, completely upending our expectation of where the story is going and who the protagonist is.

At this point the perspective shifts to Bates Motel owner Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins), and because one fakeout apparently wasn't enough, Hitch then builds up Norman's mother to be the killer only to reveal that it's actually a mentally ill Norman himself.

As it turns out, Norman has developed an alternate personality in his mind in the vein of his mother, who he himself killed many years earlier.