MADAME SIN

US, 1972, 75 minutes, Colour.
Bette Davis, Denholm Elliot, Robert Wagner, Gordon Jackson, Dudley Sutton.
Directed by David Greene.

Bette Davis at her best, nor using her talents to the full, this is a post-Bondian adventure, made with a large budget for US TV screening. Scottish location scenery is a great asset. It is enjoyable, full of Dr No type power-hunger in Madame Sin herself, with spy melodrama and highly imaginative science fiction in brainwashing and mind control. It limps in not making Madame Sin as strong as might be - the best lines go to Denholm Elliot as her associate. Robert Wagner is a conventional enough hero. Successful when far-fetched in scope, lame in not being as light-hearted as it intends to be

1. Was this an enjoyable adventure? Why? What ware its best features to make it different from similar films?

2. Was it evident that the film was made for television? Its style? Pauses for commercials etc? Not a great deal of attention given to characterisation etc? Comment on the use of Scottish scenery and the evident use of a large budget.

3. Is it too far-fetched to see the film as a fable like Dr No? How was Madame Sin like Dr No? Or is this reading too much into Madame Sin as a villainess?

4. What impressions of Madame Sin? Was she in any way sympathetic? Bette Davis's performance? Her style of acting? Was she a convincing villainess? What was Madame Sin's driving ambition? How power hunger? How ambitious for money? Of domination over others? Of revenging for spite? How much a female villainess contrasting with a male villain? Did the strength of the film depend on Madame Sin?

5. What did the film have to about spies? Was Anthony Lawrence a convincing spy? The importance of the long opening sequences and his loneliness? His being kidnapped? His response to the situation on the island? His joining Madame Sin? What did the film have to say about the life of a spy? The emotional distress? His moral choices?

6. How interesting was the film as a spy adventure - in terms of the CIA and spy gimmicks, spying and eaves-dropping techniques etc? Was this convincing? Which ware the best features?

7. How successful was the film as science fiction? Madame Sin's laboratories and her scientists? The details of their experiments? Their capacities for mind control? The possibilities of mind control and brain washing for power? How was this illustrated for Anthony Lawrence, for Barbara, for Cavendish etc? Did these sequences seem convincing?

8. What reaction when you a Polaris submarine was to be stolen? Was this laughable or realistic? Why? Was the plan plausible? The use of Lawrence? The brainwashing? The programming so that nothing would be amiss? How well executed was it? an interesting and exciting part of the film? Especially at the end with the return to the submarine?

9. How important were the minor characters in the film? Especially Madame Sin's assistant? (He had the best lines.) How evil were they? The driver of the car and the shooting of the helicopter? The role of Barbara in the plan? Could she be a character when she was brainwashed?

10. The end of the film? How ruthless did Madame Sin seem? Shock at Lawrence's death?

11. With whom was the audience meant to identify? With Madame Sin at all? The contrast between the callousness of Lawrence's death and her final joke about Windsor Castle? Was this in proportion?

12. Was this a successful film for entertainment? As spy and science fiction drama? Did it probe any values at all?