Modern Dolittle delivers big
Dolittle (PG, 106 mins) Directed by Stephen Gaghan Reviewed by Graeme Tuckett ★★★★
The saddest words in human history were uttered in the lobby of Wellington’s lovely Empire Cinema last week. And I was there to hear them. Waiting to pick up my ticket to
Spies in Disguise (which turned out to be a pile of clever fun) I was standing next to a slightly flustered young mother who had arrived too late to take her daughter to the new
Shaun The Sheep movie. Turning to her 4-year-old with a sigh that captured existential despair in a way the collected works of Wittgenstein, Kafka and Nick Cave never could, ‘‘OK,’’ she said. ‘‘We can see Frozen 2. Again.’’
Later, as I was walking out, a new poster caught my eye. ‘‘Bum,’’ I thought. Some numpty has remade Doctor Dolittle with Robert Downey Jr. Because, on the face of it, there’s exactly nothing that a 21st century Dolittle can add to a world already over-burdened with cultural detritus, is there? The film at least skips any origin-myth malarkey and instead catapults us to a later era Dolittle. He lives, as you know, on a bucolic estate in the English countryside, surrounded by rolling meadows and woodland, populated by animals he has nursed back to health. All of whom he can talk to.
When Dolittle’s retreat is invaded, firstly by some sort of junior member of the British royal family, beseeching Dolittle to come and attend to the youngbut-deathly-ill Queen Victoria – and then by a lad who has ‘‘accidentally’’ shot a squirrel and is now having a crisis of conscience over it, he must wearily and grumpily rise to the occasion and risk contact with human society again – despite having vowed to never do this, for reasons to inevitably be revealed in flashback.
All of which somehow turns into a voyage to a hidden island, a quest for a mythical fruit and a dragon who has clearly ridden in to the film on the back of the kitchen sink that writer-director Stephen Gaghan (Syriana) lobs at his creation early and often. And yet, somehow, it works. Or at least, it worked a treat on the full-house of young’uns I watched Dolittle with, all of whom were giggling, guffawing and occasionally ducking behind their seats the way the film-makers would have hoped.
Downey Jr, appearing in nearly every frame of the film, works as only an actor who has been promised a share of the profits can, mugging, prat-falling and emoting all over the shop. It’s a credit to Downey Jr that his Dolittle never once reminded me of his Tony Stark/Iron Man creation, despite the two characters occupying a similar, ‘‘reluctant-hero’’ thematic space. Downey’s decision to make his Dolittle Welsh, might actually have been the saving of the film. Next to Downey Jr, Harry Collett
(Dunkirk) and Carmel Laniado are both absolutely fine as the young interlopers in Dolittle’s life, while an impressive array of names get behind various animal voices. Emma Thompson, John Cena, Octavia Spencer, Ralph Fiennes, Marion Cotillard are just a few of the wildly diverse lineup who fronted for Dolittle duties.
I’m not here to tell you that
Dolittle is a great film. It’s been edited with a hatchet, is occasionally nonsensical and not every character earns their screentime. But there’s a refreshing lightheartedness and good nature about this film that I liked.
Plus, the kids seemed to love it. And that means you might not have to see Frozen 2 again.