Set in the freezing, isolated landscape of Plainfield, Wisconsin, in 1957, the film is a slow-burn, disturbing character study. The story follows Ed Gein, a lonely, socially awkward handyman living under the psychological shadow (and memory) of his fanatically religious and domineering mother, Augusta.
The film eschews cheap jump scares to focus on the deterioration of Ed's mind following his mother's death. He desperately tries to "keep her alive" through macabre rituals and grave robbing. The narrative cuts between Ed's descent and the investigation by Sheriff Schley, a small-town lawman who cannot believe "weird Eddie" is capable of malice, until the disappearance of local hardware store owner Bernice Worden. The climax is the infamous discovery of the "house of horrors," shot not as a monster movie, but as a grotesque human tragedy.
