Chattanooga Times Free Press - ChattanoogaNow
Robert Downey Jr. talks to the animals, without seeming to care about them
The new film “Dolittle” proves there’s more than one way to spell “Dolittle,” its preferred spelling being “J-u-m-a-n-j-i.”
In what feels like a corporate panic, co-writer and director Stephen Gaghan’s franchise hopeful trades charm for noise, and wit for a climactic dragon colonoscopy (don’t ask, don’t tell). Meantime, Robert Downey Jr. offers a determined Scottish burr as a replacement for the bored silken tones of Rex Harrison, star of the 1967 musical “Doctor Dolittle,” and Eddie Murphy, headliner of the non-musical 1998 remake and its 2001 sequel.
Even in a realm of corporate moviemaking dependent on digital effects and green screenery, you’d hope that a project co-written and directed by the same person, in this case “Syriana” filmmaker Stephen Gaghan, might retain some semblance of personality. Along with everything worth tossing — the quaint colonialist racism, for starters — Lofting’s adventures of the animal doctor conversant in myriad mammal, aquatic, insect and aviary languages offer plenty for reinvestigation.
Downey, however, favors a blase, throwit-away delivery and demeanor that can easily lapse into a form of subtle heckling. After his
wife and fellow explorer dies in a shipwreck, Dr. D hides away, Howard Hughes-like, in his private, zoo-like house and grounds donated by Queen Victoria (Jessie Buckley). Two young people coincidentally pay the doctor a visit at the same time, forcing him
out of his hermit zone: a teen royal (Carmel Laniado), sent to fetch Dolittle to save the mysteriously ailing queen; and a tender local lad (Harry Collett) who has accidentally shot a squirrel and seeks emergency treatment.
The palace intrigue features Michael Sheen and Jim Broadbent, mugging and skulking as the queen’s enemies. Soon enough, a newly engaged Dolittle shakes off his grief and what appears to be agoraphobia and takes off across the seas in search of a magical potion to save Her Majesty.
The problems begin and end with the script, credited to three writers. “Dolittle” turns its title character into an eccentric and wearying blur of tics, tacked onto a character who comports himself like a bullying, egocentric A-lister rather than someone who, you know, actually enjoys the company of animals. The banter enjoys the benefit of genuine comic pros doing the voices, but the zingers remain low on zing, bordering on total zinglessness.
Then “Dolittle” turns into a “Jumanji” sequel, or a “Pirates of the Caribbean” knockoff, with Antonio Banderas as a Jack Sparrow-influenced adversary. I won’t go into details regarding the dragon rectal exam, except to note that Gaghan doesn’t know if he should treat this development seriously or comically. He settles for a little bit of neither.
As for Downey Jr.’s dialect: It’s thick. The synchronization is never quite right, so it never seems to be human speech coming out of a specific human’s mouth. All those digital and A-list millions don’t come to much in “Dolittle,” though I did appreciate Kumail Nanjiani’s vocal flourishes as the ostrich. I wouldn’t say I prefer the clunky 1967 musical to the frenetic mechanical bull of this version. But I wouldn’t say I don’t.