Page "False protagonist" Paragraph 2

Alfred Hitchcock's film Psycho is probably the first film to feature a false protagonist.

It opens with actress Janet Leigh as the main character ; however, she is killed partway through the film, making the murder far more unexpected and shocking.

The death of the character assumed to be the protagonist takes the audience completely by surprise and builds the villain Bates up to be far more fearsome and frightening.

Hitchcock felt that the opening scenes with Leigh as the false protagonist were so important to the film that when it was released in theaters, he compelled theater owners to enforce a " no late admission " policy.