Things that make it work — #1: The performance from Anthony Perkins as a shy, seemingly-harmless but kind of odd motel manager. I’ve met people like this and Perkins plays it convincingly. #2: The famous shower scene where Janet Leigh is murdered. Everyone in the theatre knew it was coming and it still made everyone jump. It’s unexpected. #3: The sudden, deafening soundtrack that cues each murder scene. From Wikipedia: “The soundtrack of screeching violins, violas, and cellos was an original all-strings piece by composer Bernard Herrmann entitled ‘The Murder.’ Hitchcock originally wanted the sequence (and all motel scenes) to play without music, but Herrmann begged him to try it with the cue he had composed. Afterwards, Hitchcock agreed that it vastly intensified the scene, and he nearly doubled Herrmann’s salary.” My only complaint is the basement scene near the end of the movie that should have been the big, shocking reveal but turns into a laugh-out-loud joke because somebody is wearing a dress and it just looks silly. Psycho does have its dated qualities (especially in that basement scene), but it’s one of Hitchcock’s most exciting movies. It definitely stands out from the rest of his work.

I watch less than a couple of hours of television a week, but the kids watch it a lot; it’s their baby-sitter. We want to reduce our dependency on it, keeping them busy with creative and engaging activities instead.

I know a couple people who are tv-less, which I respect a lot. I’m doing some googling about breaking the tv-habit, but I could use any advice and ideas:

How do you keep a 7 year old and 3 year old busy without a television and without destroying the house?

UPDATE: It has nothing to do with the television show. It’s a spoof on the today’s technology compared to that of 1994.

Uh huh.

They don’t have The Six Million Dollar Man. Bummer.

(Thanks, Pender)

No, I didn’t know and wish I didn’t.

Degrassi is a Canadian television institution – a classic reincarnation of a 1980′s show called Degrassi Junior High which aired on CBC. It’s about a group of adolescents trying to get through school as they deal with typical growing up issues. For you Americans, it’s like Saved By The Bell with equally bad acting (I was going to write “worse acting”, but really – that’s unimaginable) but less commercialism; however, I still watched it way back when; it had a hint of honesty.

My wife and I didn’t have a television for almost a year once and we didn’t miss it. I’d like to get rid of ours; I rarely watch it now; I’m too busy being with my daughter or I’m on the computer.

(via Slashdot)

(via J-Walk)