Poseidon-3 Review of The Young Doctors

The Young Doctors (1961)

Serious - at times nail-biting - though dated, slice of hospital melodrama

[4 May 2007]

Featuring a title that may lead people to believe that this is a sudsy, youth-oriented flick akin to "The Interns" or "Dr. Kildare", this is actually a rather sober account of the role that pathology plays in the world of medicine, surgery and obstetrics. Gazzara plays an idealistic, confident young doctor of pathology sent to a decaying city hospital in order to assist the aging March, who is running the department his way, with his head buried partially in the sand. The two butt heads immediately as Gazzara attempts to make changes and improvements to the lab and to their procedures while jaded assistant Andrews looks on. Things get particularly dicey when hospital intern Clark asks the department to order a particular blood test for his wife who is in danger of delivering a baby with RH Factor. March, used to running the ship his way bristles at the test and rebuff's Gazzara, who wants it done. (These two have a similar rivalry to Robert Stack and Joan Crawford in "The Caretakers" - old guard versus the new way.) Meanwhile, Gazzara romances pretty student nurse Balin who catches him by feigning a sore knee, a decision she comes to regret after a time. Albert plays a dedicated Ob-Gyn who is in charge of Clark's wife Love. Eventually, March's missteps lead to grave consequences for a new patient at the hospital and Gazzara soon has the weight of the world on his own shoulders as he has to decide the fate of a patient he knows and loves. Gazzara is strong in his role, balancing romantic scenes with confrontational ones against March. He also gets to poke fun at fellow Actors Studio member Marlon Brando in one scene. March is excellent. He adds dimension and texture in spades to a character that could have been a cardboard villain in other hands. Clark is surprisingly good in a role that requires angst and drama. Balin has fresh appeal, though she retains an aloof quality much of the time. One hilarious shot has her waking up after a particularly rough night with her hair immaculately coiffed and every eyelash in place, but that was the way back then. Albert is wonderful in his role, supplying casual humor and heart-rending suspense in equal measure. He has an operation near the end of the film that is agonizing (and features one incredibly adorable patient!) The cast is dotted with stalwart actors, some of whom get almost nothing to say or do. MacMahon has a nice part as a caring and concerned physician and Hill has a lengthy opening scene, but Hughes hardly clocks any screen time and Murphy has maybe one line! Segal, making his first film appearance is seen pretty often, but has limited dialogue. TV favorite Sweet has a small role as a, what else, policeman. Only a die-hard fan or a detective could successfully seek out Olympic Figure Skating Medalist Button as an operating intern. (Oddly, there's an ice-skating scene in the film, but he's nowhere to be found there.) A series of documentary-like vignettes opening the film are narrated by none other than Ronald Reagan! It's a fascinating glimpse into what medical procedures were like 40 some odd years ago (much has changed!), kept interesting by a talented cast that does very well with the material.