Complete listed story — includes the ending
Psycho
In Phoenix, Arizona, real estate secretary Marion Crane embezzles $40,000 in cash from her employer after hearing her boyfriend, Sam Loomis, complain that his debts are delaying their marriage. She sets off to drive to Sam's home in the town of Fairvale, California, switching cars in Bakersfield after an encounter with a suspicious policeman. A rainstorm forces Marion to stop at the secluded Bates Motel a few miles from Fairvale. Norman Bates, the proprietor, whose house overlooks the motel, registers Marion (who uses an alias) and invites her to dinner with him in the motel's office. When Norman returns to his house to retrieve the food, Marion overhears him arguing with his mother about his desire to dine with Marion. After returning, he discusses his hobby as a taxidermist, his mother's "illness", and how everyone is in a "private trap" they cannot escape. When Marion suggests that Norman should have his mother institutionalized, he becomes agitated and insists that she is harmless.
Marion decides to drive back to Phoenix in the morning to return the stolen money. As she showers, a shadowy figure enters the bathroom with a kitchen knife and stabs her to death. Moments later, Norman runs to the motel to find Marion dead. He hurriedly cleans up the murder scene and places Marion's body, her belongings, and, unbeknownst to him, the hidden cash in her car before sinking the vehicle in a swamp.
Marion's sister Lila arrives in Fairvale a week later, tells Sam about the theft, and demands information about Marion's whereabouts. He denies knowing anything about Marion's disappearance. Arbogast, a private investigator, approaches them, stating that he has been hired to retrieve the money. He stops at the Bates Motel and questions Norman, whose nervousness and inconsistent answers arouse his suspicion. Arbogast examines the guest register and discovers from some handwriting in it that Marion spent a night in the motel. When Arbogast infers from his conversation with Norman that Marion had spoken to his mother, Arbogast asks to speak to her, but Norman refuses. Arbogast leaves and calls Lila to tell her of his suspicions. When he returns and enters the Bates' house to search for Norman's mother, a shadowy figure at the top of the stairs stabs him to death.
When Sam and Lila do not hear back from Arbogast, Sam goes to the motel to look for him. Sam spots a silhouette in a second-floor window of the house and assumes it is Norman's mother, who is unresponsive to Sam's calls. Lila and Sam alert the local sheriff, Al Chambers, who tells them Norman's mother killed herself and her lover with strychnine poisoning 10 years earlier. Chambers suggests that Arbogast lied to Sam and Lila so he could pursue Marion and the money.
Convinced that something happened to Arbogast, Lila and Sam drive to the motel and check in. Sam distracts Norman in the office while Lila sneaks into the Bates' house. Suspicious, Norman knocks Sam out. As Norman heads to the house, Lila hides in the fruit cellar and discovers the mummified body of Norman's mother. Lila screams in horror, and Norman, wearing a dress and a wig, enters the cellar and attacks her with a knife, only to be subdued by a recovered Sam.
At the police station, a psychiatrist explains to Lila, Sam, and Chambers that Norman murdered his domineering mother and her lover out of jealousy. Unable to bear the guilt, he stole his mother's corpse and treated it as if she were still alive, then re-created his mother as an alternate personality, as jealous and possessive toward Norman as she had been in life. Whenever Norman was attracted to a woman, "Mother" would take over; under the "Mother" personality, Norman killed two women before he killed Marion and Arbogast. The psychiatrist concludes that "Mother" has now completely submerged Norman's personality. Norman sits in a jail cell and hears his mother's voice stating the murders were his doing and that she would never be suspected. Marion's car is towed from the swamp.
Vertigo
San Francisco detective John "Scottie" Ferguson and a fellow policeman chase a crook on the roofs of several houses; Scottie slips and nearly falls. His colleague attempts to rescue Scottie, but falls to his death.
Some time later, Scottie has retired due to acrophobia and accompanying vertigo caused by the incident. Midge, his ex-fiancée, says that another severe emotional shock may be the only cure. Midge retains feelings for Scottie, but he is not receptive to her intimations.
Gavin Elster, an acquaintance from college, asks Scottie to follow his wife, Madeleine, claiming that she has been behaving strangely. Scottie follows Madeleine to the grave of Carlotta Valdes, who died in 1857, at the Mission San Francisco de Asís, and to the Legion of Honor art museum, where she gazes at the Portrait of Carlotta.
A local historian explains that Carlotta Valdes committed suicide: she had been the mistress of a wealthy married man and borne his child, and the otherwise childless man kept the child and cast her aside. Carlotta, who Gavin fears is possessing Madeleine, was Madeleine's great-grandmother. However, Madeleine does not know this or remember the places she has visited while ostensibly possessed. Scottie trails her to Fort Point and rescues her after she jumps into San Francisco Bay.
The next day, Madeleine stops to deliver a letter of gratitude to Scottie, and they spend the day together. They travel to Muir Woods and Cypress Point on 17-Mile Drive, where they embrace. The next day, Madeleine recounts a nightmare, and Scottie identifies its setting as Mission San Juan Bautista, Carlotta's childhood home. He drives her there, and they express their love for each other. Madeleine suddenly runs into the church and up the bell tower, asking Scottie not to follow her. Scottie runs after her, but is halted on the steps by his fear of heights and sees her plunge to her death.
An inquest into Madeleine's death declares it a suicide, though the coroner rebukes Scottie for not doing more to save her. Gavin also does not fault Scottie, but announces that he plans to leave the country. Scottie becomes clinically depressed and is sent to a sanatorium in an almost catatonic state. Following his release, he frequents the places that Madeleine visited, often imagining that he sees her. One day, he notices a woman on the street who, although superficially very different, reminds him of Madeleine. He follows her into her apartment, where she identifies herself as Judy Barton, from Salina, Kansas.
A flashback reveals that Judy was the person Scottie knew as "Madeleine Elster"; she had been impersonating Gavin's wife in an elaborate murder scheme. Gavin took advantage of Scottie's fear of heights to substitute his wife's freshly-killed body in the apparent suicide jump. Judy writes a note to Scottie confessing her involvement in the plot, but tears it up and decides to continue the charade because she loves him.
The two begin seeing each other, but Scottie remains obsessed with "Madeleine" and asks Judy to change her clothes and dye her hair to resemble her. After she complies, he notices her wearing the necklace portrayed in Carlotta's painting. Realizing the truth, he drives Judy back to the mission.
There, he tells her that he must re-enact the event that led to his madness, and that he now knows that "Madeleine" and Judy are the same person, with Judy having been Gavin's mistress before being cast aside just as Carlotta had been. He forces her up the bell tower and makes her admit her deceit. Judy confesses that Gavin paid her to impersonate a "possessed" Madeleine and begs Scottie to forgive her. He embraces Judy at the top of the tower, but a shadowy figure—a nun investigating the noise—rises from the tower's staircase, startling her. Judy lunges backward off the tower to her death; Scottie, bereaved once again but cured of his fear of heights, stands on the ledge in shock while the nun rings the mission bell.
Rear Window
In the mid-1950s, photojournalist L. B. "Jeff" Jefferies, recuperating from assignment-related injuries, in a cast from his hip to his foot, is wheelchair-bound in his Greenwich Village apartment. His mid-floor rear window looks onto a courtyard with small garden plots, surrounded on four sides by apartments in adjoining buildings. Jeff is regularly visited by Stella, a nurse, and his couture-clad girlfriend, Lisa Fremont, a model and socialite. Jeff and Lisa disagree about whether their relationship can survive different lifestyles.
During a heat wave, Jeff watches his neighbors through open windows, including a newlywed couple; a professional dancer coined "Miss Torso"; a songwriter with writer's block; a spinster who pantomimes dates with pretend suitors, "Miss Lonely-Hearts"; and traveling costume jewelry salesman Lars Thorwald, henpecked by his bedridden wife. One night, Jeff hears a woman scream, followed by the sound of breaking glass. Later that night, he observes Thorwald making repeated excursions carrying his sample case. After Jeff has fallen asleep, Thorwald leaves his apartment along with a woman.
The next morning, Jeff notices that Thorwald's wife seems to be gone, and Thorwald is cleaning a large knife and a handsaw. Movers haul away a large trunk. After surveilling with binoculars and a camera's telephoto lens, Jeff grows suspicious of Thorwald's activities. Convinced Thorwald has murdered his wife, he first tells Stella, who becomes morbidly interested in the case, and then Lisa, who doubts him until they notice that Thorwald's wife is no longer in bed and the mattress is rolled up.
Jeff calls his friend, detective Tom Doyle, to request that he investigate Thorwald. A skeptical Doyle investigates, finds nothing suspicious, and posits that Thorwald sent his wife on a vacation upstate. Jeff and Lisa are temporarily mollified by this explanation. Later that night, however, a neighbor's dog is found dead in the courtyard; the previous day, Thorwald had chased the dog away from digging his garden flowerbed. The dog's alarmed owner cries out, drawing the attention of everyone except Thorwald, who sits furtively in his dark apartment. Now convinced his theory is true, Jeff looks at slides taken two weeks earlier and notices that Thorwald has replanted flowers in his garden, possibly to bury a body part.
The following night, Jeff telephones to lure Thorwald away from his apartment, enabling Lisa and Stella to investigate Thorwald's flowerbed. Finding nothing, Lisa climbs into Thorwald's open window to search his apartment. Stella hurries back to Jeff.
While Lisa is searching, Jeff and Stella are distracted watching Miss Lonely-Hearts contemplating an overdose. Returning unexpectedly, Thorwald catches and attacks Lisa, causing Lisa to cry out. Jeff calls the police to report a man assaulting a woman at Thorwald's apartment. The police arrive to intervene as Lisa and Thorwald scuffle. During police questioning, Lisa signals to Jeff that she is wearing Mrs. Thorwald's wedding ring. Seeing this, Thorwald realizes Jeff is surveilling his apartment. Lacking proof to accuse Thorwald of murder, Lisa allows herself to be arrested for breaking and entering to be taken away safely. Coincidentally, the songwriter had finished his song "Lisa", playing loudly; enthralled by the tune, Miss Lonely-Hearts abandons her suicide attempt.
Jeff phones Doyle, leaving an urgent message, while Stella bails Lisa out of jail. Locating Jeff's apartment, Thorwald attacks him; Jeff's only defense in a darkened apartment is snapping his camera flash bulbs in Thorwald's eyes. While they grapple, Doyle and police officers arrive, followed by Lisa and Stella. Police apprehend Thorwald just as he drops Jeff out of his window. Thorwald confesses to his wife's murder, dumping her remains in the East River, and relocating a hat box containing her head after the dog tried to dig it up.
Days later, the heat wave has broken, and life in the apartment complex has returned to normal. Miss Lonely-Hearts is socializing with the songwriter in his studio apartment while he plays piano; Thorwald's neighbors get a new puppy; Miss Torso's unprepossessing boyfriend returns from army deployment, and the newlyweds are more aloof. Having broken his other leg in the fall, Jeff remains wheelchair-bound, now with both legs in casts. As he naps, Lisa, in casual attire, surreptitiously switches from reading a book on travel exploration to a fashion magazine.
In Phoenix, Arizona, real estate secretary Marion Crane embezzles $40,000 in cash from her employer after hearing her boyfriend, Sam Loomis, complain that his debts are delaying their marriage. She sets off to drive to Sam's home in the town of Fairvale, California, switching cars in Bakersfield after an encounter with a suspicious policeman. A rainstorm forces Marion to stop at the secluded Bates Motel a few miles from Fairvale. Norman Bates, the proprietor, whose house overlooks the motel, registers Marion (who uses an alias) and invites her to dinner with him in the motel's office. When Norman returns to his house to retrieve the food, Marion overhears him arguing with his mother about his desire to dine with Marion. After returning, he discusses his hobby as a taxidermist, his mother's "illness", and how everyone is in a "private trap" they cannot escape. When Marion suggests that Norman should have his mother institutionalized, he becomes agitated and insists that she is harmless.
Marion decides to drive back to Phoenix in the morning to return the stolen money. As she showers, a shadowy figure enters the bathroom with a kitchen knife and stabs her to death. Moments later, Norman runs to the motel to find Marion dead. He hurriedly cleans up the murder scene and places Marion's body, her belongings, and, unbeknownst to him, the hidden cash in her car before sinking the vehicle in a swamp.
Marion's sister Lila arrives in Fairvale a week later, tells Sam about the theft, and demands information about Marion's whereabouts. He denies knowing anything about Marion's disappearance. Arbogast, a private investigator, approaches them, stating that he has been hired to retrieve the money. He stops at the Bates Motel and questions Norman, whose nervousness and inconsistent answers arouse his suspicion. Arbogast examines the guest register and discovers from some handwriting in it that Marion spent a night in the motel. When Arbogast infers from his conversation with Norman that Marion had spoken to his mother, Arbogast asks to speak to her, but Norman refuses. Arbogast leaves and calls Lila to tell her of his suspicions. When he returns and enters the Bates' house to search for Norman's mother, a shadowy figure at the top of the stairs stabs him to death.
When Sam and Lila do not hear back from Arbogast, Sam goes to the motel to look for him. Sam spots a silhouette in a second-floor window of the house and assumes it is Norman's mother, who is unresponsive to Sam's calls. Lila and Sam alert the local sheriff, Al Chambers, who tells them Norman's mother killed herself and her lover with strychnine poisoning 10 years earlier. Chambers suggests that Arbogast lied to Sam and Lila so he could pursue Marion and the money.
Convinced that something happened to Arbogast, Lila and Sam drive to the motel and check in. Sam distracts Norman in the office while Lila sneaks into the Bates' house. Suspicious, Norman knocks Sam out. As Norman heads to the house, Lila hides in the fruit cellar and discovers the mummified body of Norman's mother. Lila screams in horror, and Norman, wearing a dress and a wig, enters the cellar and attacks her with a knife, only to be subdued by a recovered Sam.
At the police station, a psychiatrist explains to Lila, Sam, and Chambers that Norman murdered his domineering mother and her lover out of jealousy. Unable to bear the guilt, he stole his mother's corpse and treated it as if she were still alive, then re-created his mother as an alternate personality, as jealous and possessive toward Norman as she had been in life. Whenever Norman was attracted to a woman, "Mother" would take over; under the "Mother" personality, Norman killed two women before he killed Marion and Arbogast. The psychiatrist concludes that "Mother" has now completely submerged Norman's personality. Norman sits in a jail cell and hears his mother's voice stating the murders were his doing and that she would never be suspected. Marion's car is towed from the swamp.
Vertigo
San Francisco detective John "Scottie" Ferguson and a fellow policeman chase a crook on the roofs of several houses; Scottie slips and nearly falls. His colleague attempts to rescue Scottie, but falls to his death.
Some time later, Scottie has retired due to acrophobia and accompanying vertigo caused by the incident. Midge, his ex-fiancée, says that another severe emotional shock may be the only cure. Midge retains feelings for Scottie, but he is not receptive to her intimations.
Gavin Elster, an acquaintance from college, asks Scottie to follow his wife, Madeleine, claiming that she has been behaving strangely. Scottie follows Madeleine to the grave of Carlotta Valdes, who died in 1857, at the Mission San Francisco de Asís, and to the Legion of Honor art museum, where she gazes at the Portrait of Carlotta.
A local historian explains that Carlotta Valdes committed suicide: she had been the mistress of a wealthy married man and borne his child, and the otherwise childless man kept the child and cast her aside. Carlotta, who Gavin fears is possessing Madeleine, was Madeleine's great-grandmother. However, Madeleine does not know this or remember the places she has visited while ostensibly possessed. Scottie trails her to Fort Point and rescues her after she jumps into San Francisco Bay.
The next day, Madeleine stops to deliver a letter of gratitude to Scottie, and they spend the day together. They travel to Muir Woods and Cypress Point on 17-Mile Drive, where they embrace. The next day, Madeleine recounts a nightmare, and Scottie identifies its setting as Mission San Juan Bautista, Carlotta's childhood home. He drives her there, and they express their love for each other. Madeleine suddenly runs into the church and up the bell tower, asking Scottie not to follow her. Scottie runs after her, but is halted on the steps by his fear of heights and sees her plunge to her death.
An inquest into Madeleine's death declares it a suicide, though the coroner rebukes Scottie for not doing more to save her. Gavin also does not fault Scottie, but announces that he plans to leave the country. Scottie becomes clinically depressed and is sent to a sanatorium in an almost catatonic state. Following his release, he frequents the places that Madeleine visited, often imagining that he sees her. One day, he notices a woman on the street who, although superficially very different, reminds him of Madeleine. He follows her into her apartment, where she identifies herself as Judy Barton, from Salina, Kansas.
A flashback reveals that Judy was the person Scottie knew as "Madeleine Elster"; she had been impersonating Gavin's wife in an elaborate murder scheme. Gavin took advantage of Scottie's fear of heights to substitute his wife's freshly-killed body in the apparent suicide jump. Judy writes a note to Scottie confessing her involvement in the plot, but tears it up and decides to continue the charade because she loves him.
The two begin seeing each other, but Scottie remains obsessed with "Madeleine" and asks Judy to change her clothes and dye her hair to resemble her. After she complies, he notices her wearing the necklace portrayed in Carlotta's painting. Realizing the truth, he drives Judy back to the mission.
There, he tells her that he must re-enact the event that led to his madness, and that he now knows that "Madeleine" and Judy are the same person, with Judy having been Gavin's mistress before being cast aside just as Carlotta had been. He forces her up the bell tower and makes her admit her deceit. Judy confesses that Gavin paid her to impersonate a "possessed" Madeleine and begs Scottie to forgive her. He embraces Judy at the top of the tower, but a shadowy figure—a nun investigating the noise—rises from the tower's staircase, startling her. Judy lunges backward off the tower to her death; Scottie, bereaved once again but cured of his fear of heights, stands on the ledge in shock while the nun rings the mission bell.
Rear Window
In the mid-1950s, photojournalist L. B. "Jeff" Jefferies, recuperating from assignment-related injuries, in a cast from his hip to his foot, is wheelchair-bound in his Greenwich Village apartment. His mid-floor rear window looks onto a courtyard with small garden plots, surrounded on four sides by apartments in adjoining buildings. Jeff is regularly visited by Stella, a nurse, and his couture-clad girlfriend, Lisa Fremont, a model and socialite. Jeff and Lisa disagree about whether their relationship can survive different lifestyles.
During a heat wave, Jeff watches his neighbors through open windows, including a newlywed couple; a professional dancer coined "Miss Torso"; a songwriter with writer's block; a spinster who pantomimes dates with pretend suitors, "Miss Lonely-Hearts"; and traveling costume jewelry salesman Lars Thorwald, henpecked by his bedridden wife. One night, Jeff hears a woman scream, followed by the sound of breaking glass. Later that night, he observes Thorwald making repeated excursions carrying his sample case. After Jeff has fallen asleep, Thorwald leaves his apartment along with a woman.
The next morning, Jeff notices that Thorwald's wife seems to be gone, and Thorwald is cleaning a large knife and a handsaw. Movers haul away a large trunk. After surveilling with binoculars and a camera's telephoto lens, Jeff grows suspicious of Thorwald's activities. Convinced Thorwald has murdered his wife, he first tells Stella, who becomes morbidly interested in the case, and then Lisa, who doubts him until they notice that Thorwald's wife is no longer in bed and the mattress is rolled up.
Jeff calls his friend, detective Tom Doyle, to request that he investigate Thorwald. A skeptical Doyle investigates, finds nothing suspicious, and posits that Thorwald sent his wife on a vacation upstate. Jeff and Lisa are temporarily mollified by this explanation. Later that night, however, a neighbor's dog is found dead in the courtyard; the previous day, Thorwald had chased the dog away from digging his garden flowerbed. The dog's alarmed owner cries out, drawing the attention of everyone except Thorwald, who sits furtively in his dark apartment. Now convinced his theory is true, Jeff looks at slides taken two weeks earlier and notices that Thorwald has replanted flowers in his garden, possibly to bury a body part.
The following night, Jeff telephones to lure Thorwald away from his apartment, enabling Lisa and Stella to investigate Thorwald's flowerbed. Finding nothing, Lisa climbs into Thorwald's open window to search his apartment. Stella hurries back to Jeff.
While Lisa is searching, Jeff and Stella are distracted watching Miss Lonely-Hearts contemplating an overdose. Returning unexpectedly, Thorwald catches and attacks Lisa, causing Lisa to cry out. Jeff calls the police to report a man assaulting a woman at Thorwald's apartment. The police arrive to intervene as Lisa and Thorwald scuffle. During police questioning, Lisa signals to Jeff that she is wearing Mrs. Thorwald's wedding ring. Seeing this, Thorwald realizes Jeff is surveilling his apartment. Lacking proof to accuse Thorwald of murder, Lisa allows herself to be arrested for breaking and entering to be taken away safely. Coincidentally, the songwriter had finished his song "Lisa", playing loudly; enthralled by the tune, Miss Lonely-Hearts abandons her suicide attempt.
Jeff phones Doyle, leaving an urgent message, while Stella bails Lisa out of jail. Locating Jeff's apartment, Thorwald attacks him; Jeff's only defense in a darkened apartment is snapping his camera flash bulbs in Thorwald's eyes. While they grapple, Doyle and police officers arrive, followed by Lisa and Stella. Police apprehend Thorwald just as he drops Jeff out of his window. Thorwald confesses to his wife's murder, dumping her remains in the East River, and relocating a hat box containing her head after the dog tried to dig it up.
Days later, the heat wave has broken, and life in the apartment complex has returned to normal. Miss Lonely-Hearts is socializing with the songwriter in his studio apartment while he plays piano; Thorwald's neighbors get a new puppy; Miss Torso's unprepossessing boyfriend returns from army deployment, and the newlyweds are more aloof. Having broken his other leg in the fall, Jeff remains wheelchair-bound, now with both legs in casts. As he naps, Lisa, in casual attire, surreptitiously switches from reading a book on travel exploration to a fashion magazine.
Sources and content license
Source and revision history ↗ · Exact listed stories combined in catalog order. Sources retain their stated license; formatting and headings adjusted. Adapted from Wikipedia contributors, Psycho (1960 film). Section headings and formatting adjusted. Adapted from Wikipedia contributors, Vertigo (film). Section headings and formatting adjusted. Adapted from Wikipedia contributors, Rear Window. Section headings and formatting adjusted. · Content license