BEFORE: Before I get back to sci-fi, a mini-tribute to Jerry Lewis. Let me see if I can explain my connective reasoning here - seeing Alec Guinness play 8 roles in "Kind Hearts and Coronets" calls to mind other cases of actors playing multiple roles in a film, such as Peter Sellers in "Dr. Strangelove" (dealt with him last week), Eddie Murphy in the "Nutty Professor" remake, and Jerry Lewis, who accomplished that feat in a movie I enjoyed as a kid, called "The Family Jewels". There he played six of a little girl's uncles, and the chauffeur that takes her to visit all of them, as she chooses which one she wants to live with - a darling little film. But I've seen that film, so it's ineligible for the countdown.
THE PLOT: When he flunks out of med school, Jerome Littlefield goes to work as an orderly in a private rest home where he wreaks havoc for everyone concerned.
AFTER: Jerome is a character who means well, but everything he touches seems to fall apart. That includes his medical career - reducing him to the lowly position of an orderly in a sanitarium - and the relationship he's got going with Julie, a young nurse. When a mysterious woman shows up at the facility after a suicide attempt, Jerome knows her name and volunteers to work extra shifts to pay for her treatment. Julie puts the relationship on hold when she realizes the connection between Jerome and the mystery woman.
It's almost like a soap opera - but Lewis' slapstick antics make sure that the film never goes too close to drama, not when there's always a chance to spill little round pills all over the floor, or allow a man in a full body cast to tumble down a hill.
Fortunately, the hospital administrator was once in love with Jerome's father, so she covers up his mistakes while he sees a psychiatrist to address his mental blocks. My problem is that Jerome seems to have too many problems - he's clumsy, he's sleep-deprived, he tries too hard, he's lovelorn, and he's got some weird psychosomatic disorder where he feels sympathy pain whenever someone describes their physical ills.
(and there seem to be a lot of physical ailments for a mental hospital, but what do I know?) The film should have picked one of these problems and stuck with it.
My other sticking point is that the head nurse isn't enough of a villain - she gets frustrated with Jerome, but can't seem to stay mad at him - they could have really amped her up to "Nurse Ratched"-level, but they didn't, so they have to introduce a stuffy head of the medical board late in the film, just so there is a proper villain. And then there's a madcap ambulance chase through the Hollywood hills, where said villain is dangerously careening around traffic on a runaway stretcher. Funny or not funny? I'm not sure.
Of course, there is a resolution to the mystery of the female patient, and it leads to solving Jerome's mental blocks, so he can finally become a doctor - great, but I'm not going to let him operate on me!
Also starring Glenda Farrell, Karen Sharpe, Kathleen Freeman (last seen as Mother Mary Stigmata in "Blues Brothers 2000") and Everett Sloane as Mr. Tuffington. OH, and Alice Pearce - funny, most of the cast seems to have appeared on westerns like "Wagon Train" in the 1950's and then went on to guest-starring roles in either "Bewitched" or "I Dream of Jeannie". Hey, work is work.
RATING: 4 out of 10 laundry bags
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