Simon (1980) Madeline Kahn Alan Alda Marshall Brickman SciFi Comedy

A group of scientists take Simon, a psychology professor, as a test person for a brainwash MK Ultra mind-control experiment in a sensory deprivation tank.They regress him back to the Big-Bang & successfully convince him that he is a messianic being from another planet. The Institute for Advanced Concepts, a government Psy-op org headed by Dr. Carl Becker along with four fellow scientists, has unlimited resources secretly funded by the highest powers in the oligarch establishment elite to conduct research & surveillance to control and manipulate the world in all aspects. Their next brainchild of a project is to condition someone into believing that he is an alien and unleash him into the world, rig the media & analyse & collect the data of what happens in this psy-op. Who they choose is Psychology professor Dr. Simon Mendelssohn, partly because he was a foundling whose true origins no one can uncover or question. They are able to lure him to the Institute under the guise of being able to conduct his own research, his fascination with but little understanding of sensory deprivation which they are further able to capitalize on in the brainwashing process. To further ensure that Simon complies, they plan on using their seductive female "associate", Dr. Cynthia Mallory, to act as a Juliet operative. Unleashing Simon the alien into the world, they will have to contend with his casual girlfriend, Lisa, a Music professor at the same New York City college, she who may have her own ways of proving that Simon is not the alien he and they assert he is. Another film about scientists experimenting with sensory deprivation tanks, the Paddy Chayefsky-scripted Altered States (1980), directed by Ken Russell, was released in the same year as Simon (1980). Marshall Brickman wrote & collaborated with Woody Allen on Sleeper, Annie Hall, Manhatten & Manhatten Murder Mystery - 'Simon' is his first film as writer and director.