LAS VEGAS LADY

US, 1976, 100 minutes, Colour.
Stella Stevens, Stuart Whitman, George Di Cenzo, Andrew Stevens.
Directed by Noel Nosseck.

Las Vegas Lady is a routine caper thriller set in the sleazy underworld of Las Vegas. It is a star vehicle for Stella Stevens and Stuart Whitman - unlikely types to be engineering such a large robbery, and getting away with it. There is all the glamour of the gambling city, special effects for the robbery and for the finale. The moral of the story seems to be: if you have been oppressed and are moving into middle age without any kind of tangible reward, rob an oppressive employer and get away with it!

1. An entertaining caper thriller? The styles of robbery films over the decades -the tone of the '70s? Value?

2. The conventions of this kind of thriller: the establishing of the mystery man, the heroine and her associates and their way of life, the preparations for the robbery, its execution, dangers? The final confrontation and shoot-out? The happy ending? Anything more than conventional material?

3. Colour photography, the use of Las Vegas locations and the desert? The western village and the impact of the special effects during the credits? The editing especially for the robbery and the finale? The score?

4. The plausibility of the plot - such a robbery, by such people, success? In Las Vegas? The American tone? The final getting away with it? The robbery of criminal money and its inability to be detected?

5. Stuart Whitman as ageing hero - his work as policeman, security man, friendship with the heroine, the clashes with the gangster boss, the accident at the front of the hotel and the dismissal, the antagonism - all evidently planned for the final success? The shoot-out? A plausible hero or not?

6. Stella Stevens as heroine - her work in the Las Vegas hotels, her associates, linking up with the big spender, the timing of the robbery? The planning with the other women, especially in the sauna? The execution, things going wrong, the final shoot-out?

7. The associate women - their work in the hotel - the circus atmosphere and the trapeze? The preparations, the fears? The climbing of the hotel wall, the escape with the trolley? The clash in the card game and the torture and search by the boss and the security agent? The betrayal and leading the boss to the western city? The final showdown? Characterisations of the women - the plausibility of their doing the robbery?

8. The villain - a man to be robbed? His brutality? The world of pimps, extortionists, gambling? The public? The incident at the front door of the hotel - and the performance by Andrew Stevens, Stella Stevens' son, as the young man? The world of Las Vegas?

9. How much excitement generated by the robbery, the escape, the confrontation? A competent film of its kind? The reason for audience response and entertainment?