10 Movies That Ingeniously Subverted Expectations

Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho is boundary-smashing for many reasons - being one of the first major American films to ever show a toilet flushing, and approaching the mystery-thriller genre from an uncommonly psychological perspective.

But the film is girded by two major deconstructions of genre form. For starters, our apparent protagonist Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) is killed less than half-way through the movie in the most iconic shower scene ever put to film.

After this, the perspective shifts to motel owner Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) and later Marion's sister Lila (Vera Miles).

Given that nothing in Psycho's marketing painted Marion as anything but the beginning-to-end hero of the piece, it was a jaw-dropping shocker to audiences of the era.

And then comes that ending, where it's revealed that the killer isn't Norman's apparently psychotic mother at all but Norman himself, who has dressed up as his mother and recreated her identity within his own mind.

While such surprises are far more commonplace today, back in 1960 they were basically unheard of, allowing Hitchcock to playfully catch audiences totally off-guard.