10 WTF Horror Movie Scenes Inspired By Real Life
5. The Mother Reveal - Psycho
Alfred Hitchcock's masterful thriller Psycho culminates with the twist that the murderous "Mother" has in fact been her son Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) dressed up as her the whole time, while the real Mrs. Bates has long since been killed by Norman and is now a mummified corpse.
Beyond being adapted from Robert Bloch's novel, Psycho is loosely based on the life of murderer and grave-robber Ed Gein, especially his twisted relationship with his own mother.
Like Norman, Gein's mother was domineering, he built a shrine to her after her death, and also enjoyed dressing up in her clothes, even expressing a desire to "become" his mother.
Gein took this obsession one step further than censorship laws of 1960s cinema would allow, however, by attempting to create a "woman suit" from the skin of his victims, so he could one day step into the suit and assume his mother's identity in a more visceral - and disgusting - way.