ET’s death didn’t come with terror. I found all the death and gore in Starship Troopers to be a bit on the cartoony side. Sure there was enough of it, along with the nudity, to finally get an R, but none of it, IMHO, has the emotional impact of Psycho.
IMHO, Psycho is an R film. I think the murder of the detective alone, would get it the rating. The murder of Leigh and the Balsm Charactaers have emotional weight. The murders hit the audience hard. If I may paraphrase, “I may not be able to define an R film, but I’ll know it when I see it.”