Question: Is The Usual Suspects credited with ushering in an era of shocking last-second movie twists, or is that considered to have been a long-standing plot device? It seems like ever since that movie, suspense thrillers just aren't complete without a big shocker ending.Answer: My gut is that Psycho (1960), which predates The Usual Suspects (1995) by 35 years, was among the first mainstream movies in which a last-minute twist changes the entire tenor of what precedes it. The revelation that Mrs. Bates is dead and her son, Norman (Anthony Perkins), has committed a series of murders dressed in her clothes was such a world-class shocker that keeping it secret became part of the movie's publicity campaign, which director
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