BEFORE: Well, I've set myself up with some rather longish films this week. But I'm at home 4 days a week now, so I've got some extra time. Rex Harrison carries over from "The Agony and the Ecstasy".
THE PLOT: After the animal communicating veterinarian goes too far for his clientèle, he and his friends escape their hometown to sea in search of the Great Pink Sea Snail.
AFTER: If you hear "Doctor Dolittle" and immediately think of Eddie Murphy, it means you are a child of the modern age. The Eddie Murphy vehicle has very little in common with the original books about the character, three of which were squeezed together into a film adaptation in 1967. "Mary Poppins" had been a hit for Disney three years earlier, and no doubt the race was on among rival studios to comb through children's literature for a character that would resonate on the screen in a similar fashion.
About the only things the two films have in common are the facts that Dolittle is a veterinarian, and can somehow understand the way that animals communicate. In the Murphy film this was done with voiceovers and animal mouth animation, another product of modern times, but back in the 1960's this was done with some puppetry and forcing an acclaimed British actor to make animal sounds. See, he talks to THEM, not the other way around. The Eddie Murphy character LISTENS to animals, which is not exactly the same thing.
I was probably forced to watch this as a small child, but since I don't remember a thing about it, I'm forcing myself to re-watch it as an adult. My mother was huge on Disney films and movie musicals, plus I think she wanted me to develop an interest in veterinary medicine. Or maybe she just needed something that would distract me for two and a half hours.
The original Dr. Dolittle was not only a veterinarian, he was perhaps the first animal rights activist. In one incident he stands up to a fox hunter, defending the noble fox of course, and in another, he helps a lonely seal escape from the circus to find her husband. Before realizing the evils of the circus, however, he first made a lot of money by exhibiting a double-sided llama called a Pushmi Pullyu there - so that's a bit of a mixed message. Are circuses a good place for animals or bad for them?
Of course, he's a vegetarian as well. This is discussed in a song about a vegetarian veterinarian, which made me wonder how many of those exist - are people who work with animals more or less likely to eat meat? If you think of farmers, you think of hearty meat-based foods, but perhaps farmers also eat a lot of grains and vegetables, so maybe in the end it's a wash. Plus I suspect there are a lot of people who work closely with dogs and cats who don't think twice about eating pigs and chickens.
The song about being vegetarian had some clever rhymes, like linking "roast beef" and "leaf". By contrast, the Oscar-winning (and very cloying) song "Talk to the Animals" cheated quite a bit, by making up rhymes for "hippopotamus" and "rhinoceros" - like "Why not-apus?" and "Of course-eros!" Double-ugh. I think the song I most enjoyed was called "Fabulous Places", and it could make any geography lesson fun for kids. If you can rhyme "Trinidad and Tobago" with "Tierra del Fuego", I'm already on your side.
NITPICK POINT: Two of the songs make it seem like the film is trying to establish a relationship between Dr. Dolittle and the female lead character, Emma Fairfax - but he's, what, 30 years older than her? 40? (Ugh again.) I'm guessing this must be a carry-over from the books, because on film, with these actors, it doesn't make much sense. Earlier in the film, she kisses Matthew Mugg, who seems to be closer to her age, and even though he seems affected by the kiss, their relationship seems to go nowhere.
Apparently this bothered the filmmakers as well, because in the original cut of the film, Emma falls for Doctor Dolittle, but then the scene with the song "Where Are the Words?" was re-filmed with Matthew instead. The film's soundtrack features Matthew singing that song, but neither version of the scene made it to the final cut of the film. Hence the love-triangle related confusion.
Once Doctor Dolittle is freed from the asylum (and I'm not completely convinced that he didn't belong there), the film takes a weird turn as our heroes seek out the giant sea snail. This brings them quite arbitrarily to Sea Star Island, a place where the natives are bound by all kinds of arbitrary rewards and punishments, like for when things get colder, things get warmer, or when a rock falls into a volcano. There's something oddly like "Gulliver's Travels" here, with weird societies having weird rules, only without the Swiftian satire, or without much of a point, really.
In the end it's a bit of an odd duck - the first half makes some great points about activism and the way animals should be treated, and then the second half just wanders off to an island on a weird quest.
Also starring Anthony Newley, Samantha Eggar, Richard Attenborough, Peter Bull, William Dix, and Geoffrey Holder (last seen in "Live and Let Die").
RATING: 4 out of 10 seaweed pies
Where did you ever track down a copy of this film? I have been looking for it, but only come up with the "new" Eddie Murphy version.
ReplyDeleteI have vague memories of watching this as a child, and remember the snail scene a little. I also had the soundtrack album.