WHO KILLED BAMBI?

France, 2003, 126 minutes, Colour.
Sophie Quinton, Laurent Lucas.
Directed by Gilles Marchand.

Who Killed Bambi is a French psychological thriller. Sophie Quinton portrays Isabelle, a student nurse at a prominent hospital. Patients start disappearing and other strange things happen in the surgery. She is wary of Doctor Philipp (Laurent Lucas).

Doctor Philipp calls Isabelle Bambi because she has fainting fits and is unsteady on her legs – like the famed Disney character. However, she has to gain in moral and physical strength as she starts investigating Doctor Philipp, they play their cat-and-mouse game, ultimately with her under threat.

Commentators used the word “Hitchcock” to describe some of the aspects of the story, the suspense, the characters. However, this is a particularly French-styled thriller, with particularly French-styled characters.

1. A crime thriller? Psychological thriller? Overtones (according to the film-makers) of Dr Philippe being the equivalent of a vampire? The combination of these elements into a hospital thriller?

2. The hospital, night and day, the buildings, the campus, the nurses' home, the wards, offices, the surgeries? The bright clean look of a contemporary hospital? The musical score, atmospheric? The nurses' party music?

3. The title, Dr Philippe calling Isabel "Bambi"? Her inability to stand on her legs? Needing a mother? The symbolism of the threats to Bambi? The visual symbol of the deer at the end?

4. The plausibility of the plot, Isabel and her age, experience, training, relationship with Sami, the encounters with Dr Philippe? Her inner-ear disability? Her suspicions, her fainting, her relationship with her cousin? Telling her the truth? Growing suspicious, watching Dr Philippe, an erotic response to him as well or not? Her illness, her complaints to the board, searching his room? The build-up to the final confrontation and the sequence in the forest? Her reality and her dreams?

5. The character of Isabel, at the initial interview and discussion about language to tell family about death? Her work, classes, nervousness about the exam? Sami, her tiredness, inviting him to her room? Veronique taking care of her? Her work on the wards, the injections, the impatient patients? Dr Philippe, in the lift, her fainting, his urging her to the doctors? Her eventually having the operation - with him as one of the surgeons? Her nervousness, tiredness, Sami taking her to the party, Veronique giving her the dress and shoes? The noise, her collapse, sleeping? The encounter with Dr Philippe - and especially the game and the questions (and the words ending with consonant or vowel determining the answers)? Dr Philip’s advance on her, her response, his rebuke? His later apology, the gift of the necklace? Her going to his room to get the jacket, the doctor telling her about the necklace? Her growing suspicions, telling Veronique, Veronique's anger with her? The search of his room, his letting her go? His drugging her, the sexual encounter in the night, her waking, nude, going out to phone the police? Sami, the injection and his death? Dr Philippe taking her in the car, her struggle, the crash? Her dream, the game with the questions? Her answers? The bodies in the pit? Her thinking she was dead? Her waking up - to be haunted for her life? An interesting portrayal, credible young person, bewildered, courageous?

6. Dr Philippe, first seeing him as a sinister presence in the room? Sitting in his car, haunting the hospital - the suggestion of a vampire? His taking the drugs, his altering the dosage for the women, his abusing them? The encounter with Isabel, her illness, his concern? At work, on the wards, in the surgery? The audience knowing that he was guilty? The drugs and the anaesthetic, the failure, the two punctures in the container, his denials, taking the drugs for analysis in the laboratory? Isabel denouncing him at the meeting? His attempt to save the patient's life - after killing and abusing her? Getting rid of Isabel in his office, her searching it, his threats, the confrontation? Killing Sami after imitating his whistle? The questions in the forest after the crash, his death? A figure of evil?

7. Veronique, her care of her cousin, the dress, the shoes, concerned about her sleeping? Her not believing her and her exasperation? Seeing the doctor, looking in at the ward, seeing his crime, her death?

8. The nurses, camaraderie, training? The mistakes? Mrs Vachon and her severity, supervision?

9. The other doctors, Isabel's operation, the supervisor, the panel?

10. The opening sequence with the instructor telling the nurses about their work, setting the tone?