Poseidon-3 Review of Young Doctors in Love

Young Doctors in Love (1982)

Scattershot laughs aided by a large cast of familiar comedy faces.

[30 October 2008]

In 1982, "General Hospital" was the number one rated daytime soap opera. In 1980, "Airplane!" had rocked the box office with its zany spoofing of disaster movies. This comedy film tries to apply an "Airplane"-like sense of humor to a hospital setting, using some soap opera stars in cameo appearances to add to the fun. The film opens on New Years Eve with a passel of new interns arriving for their stint. McKean is a know-it-all, Young is a small town girl, Friedkin is a little person, McGinley a stud, Negron a near zombie from working three jobs, and so on. They are governed over by such doctors as Macnee, as a lecher, Coleman, as an egotist and Stanton, as a drunken, disheveled coroner. Reed plays an uptight head nurse. One chief plot line concerns gangster Vandis who is admitted with paralysis and then hounded by hapless hit man Richards as his foul-mouthed son Elizondo visits in disguise (which, in this case, is a thick blonde wig and the latest in ladies wear!) A romance burgeons between McKean and Young, Elizondo finds his father's doctor becoming attracted to him and Negron uses Reed to secure stimulant drugs to help him get through his long days. Throughout all this, snippets of hospital jokes feature soap stalwarts such as Beradino, Robinson, Damon, Zeman and others. La Lucci shows up briefly in a party scene with her future fellow "Dancing with the Stars" contestant McGinley. Like "Airplane!," there is often as much going on in the background of scenes as there is in the front. The jokes range from subtle to over-the-top, many of them missing the mark, though that is the case in virtually all of the films of this type ("Hot Shots", "The Naked Gun", etc…) Elizondo in drag is something that everyone ought to see (and, remarkably, he underplays it) and veterans Stanton and Coleman get some decent comedy licks in along the way. Reed is very amusing, especially before her character is transformed. However, the film is very much of its time and many contemporary viewers will be either bored or baffled by some of the gags. What really gives the movie value now is seeing some of these stars when they were young and also seeing the wide array of character performers near the start of their careers. Some of the lesser known performers such as Overton, Heffner and Rubinek are still working regularly today. Macnee's part is so negligible that it seems as if he was cut out at some point. The score, by Maurice Jarre, is effective, despite occasional echoes of his work on more sweeping epics such as "Doctor Zhivago" (which, considering that that's one of his most known scores, may be a bit of a gag in itself!)