Presented as the successor of James Dean, Anthony Perkins has long suffered in the destructive shadow of his most famous character, Norman Bates, the neurotic serial killer of Alfred Hitchcock’s masterpiece “Psycho”. His clean cut image as the ideal son-in-law, established within his first films, will not survive it.
Fortunately, the actor can play a wide range of characters within both cinema and theatre and even becomes a music crooner. One of his most famous songs is even covered by Elvis Presley. Perkins knows how to play the macho sheriff as well as a sensitive intellectual. And he relies on the dark side of his private life to build characters as complex as they are fascinating. After having to hide his homosexuality in Puritan America, he finds refuge in Paris for several years, where he can live more freely, whilst continuing to make films and record music.
He eventually marries a young photographer, Berry Berenson, with whom he would raise two sons. While his career is struggling, Perkins is saved by the return of his most infamous of characters. He agrees to star in “Psycho II”, 22 years after the first opus and will go as far as to direct “Psycho III”, definitively reconciling himself with Norman Bates.
The film takes us back to this incredible life and career with numerous excerpts from films, songs, rare archives in which Perkins speaks in impeccable French, and the testimonies and memories of friends, colleagues and journalists who have worked with him.
Genre: Art & Culture, Biography, Documentary
Director: Christophe Champclaux
Production: French Connection Films
Year: 2020
Length: 52 minutes
Languages : English, French
Partners: French Film Board (CNC), OCS
Broadcasters: OCS Géants, RTS Radio Télévision Suisse, RTBF (Belgium), Sky Arte (Italy), Ceska Televize (Czech Republic),Telewizja Polska (Poland), HRT (Croatia), RTS (Slovakia), RT Montenegro, LEPL (Georgia)
Distributor: Arte Distribution
English
Français