Le Jeune Docteur Kildare

Young Dr. Kildare is a must-see, if you're going to watch the very entertaining film series that spawned the popular television program in the 1960s. Joel McCrea played the famed doctor in an independent 1937 film, but the official series started the following year, with Lew Ayres taking over.

In this first installment, the set-up is brilliantly executed. Lew Ayres graduates from medical school and comes home to his small town. It's a very touching sequence, with his mom and dad proudly displaying his shingle on the outside of their home. Everyone is so proud of him and expects him to become the town's country doctor. Lew gets accepted to practice in a big city hospital, and he tries it out to see which lifestyle he likes. While in the big, bustling hospital, he meets the grizzly perfectionist: Lionel Barrymore. Poor Lew, he's not nearly as fondly remembered as Lionel's creation of Dr. Gillespie, even though they both went on to the extremely popular radio series The Story of Dr. Kildare in the 1950s. Lionel has that lovable crotchety-ness that endears him to the audience so they know even when he's grouchy, he's grouchy for a good reason that he'll explain later. Just like Dr. Kildare himself, you'll come to know and love the regulars at the hospital, including the telephone operators and the ambulance drivers. Nat Pendleton made his living acting in just as many of these Dr. Kildare films as the main characters! Watch this first volume, whose guest star is Monty Woolley, to see if you get hooked; I know you will.

Dr. James Kildare (Lew Ayres) is fresh out of medical school and expected to take over his father's small town practice. But Kildare decides instead to go to New York and work as an intern at Blair General Hospital. There he catches the interest of crotchety old Dr. Leonard Gillespie (Lionel Barrymore) and gets into trouble trying to prove a suicidal heiress isn't crazy.

The first in MGM's wonderful Dr. Kildare series. Paramount had released a Kildare movie the year prior to this with a different cast but that's unconnected to this series. This movie, like the rest that followed, is a classy medical drama with terrific actors and good writing. Lew Ayres was perfectly cast as the compassionate and idealistic Kildare. As would be the case in most of the series, Lionel Barrymore steals the show as the grumpy but wise Dr. Gillespie, who was so integral to the series' success that when Ayres got the boot during WW2, they handed the series over to Barrymore's Gillespie. Many of the regulars who would make up the fine supporting cast in the series appear here -- Joe the ambulance attendant (Nat Pendleton), Sally the hospital receptionist (Marie Blake), bar owner Mike Ryan (Frank Orth), and hospital administrator Dr. Carew (Walter Kingsford). Samuel S. Hinds and Emma Dunn play Kildare's parents. Nurse Lamont and Molly Byrd don't show up until the next film, though Byrd is mentioned by name in one scene. Solid performances by everybody.

It's a great movie that spawned many sequels and a (much) later TV series. Definitely something you will want to see if you're into medical dramas. Overlook the reviewers who nitpick the dated medical knowledge. That's such a ridiculous thing to complain about I can't even wrap my head around it. It's such a shame they didn't have time machines in 1938 so they could make movies that had 21st century knowledge and technology in them. Oh, well, if they had then we wouldn't be able to snark at those old primitives. God knows what a tragedy that would be! Sarcasm aside, I find the "flaws" with the medical stuff part of the appeal of the film. It gives us insight into the way such things were understood back then. That's always been a part of why I love older films -- they provide a window into the past.

Dr. James Kildare (Lew Ayres) returns home after graduation. Everybody expects him to join his father in his country doctor practice. He surprises them by announcing his internship at a large New York hospital. Cantankerous, famed, wheelchair-bound Dr. Leonard Gillespie (Lionel Barrymore) becomes his mentor. He gets into trouble with some high profile cases.

It's a medical drama which starts a franchise. It's not the first with Dr. Kildare, but this one is the one which starts the series. Lew Ayres is fine as the lead, but it's Barrymore who elevates. The medical stuff is not going to compare with modern TV shows. Barrymore is the one who compares favorably no matter what.

People, if they remember Dr. Kildare of the 30s and 40s at all, tend to think of this series of films. Most people don't know that there was a film before this series, Internes Can't Take Money, starring Joel McCrea and Barbara Stanwyck made over at Paramount in 1937.

This was the first of the Dr. Kildare series of movies which segued into the Dr. Gillespie series of films after Lew Ayres left to serve as a medic in WWII. Lew Ayres plays Dr. James Kildare, fresh out of medical school. His father, Dr. Stephen Kildare (Samuel S. Hinds), as well as his mother, (Emma Dunn) think that he is going to practice in their small town, and they've bought a plaque with his name on it and set up an office for him in their parlor. The girl next door - literally - seems ready to pick out her wedding dress.

But James has other ideas. He wants to practice medicine in a big hospital because he's not sure what specialty he is interested in, and has already accepted an internship at Blair Hospital in New York City. How this leaves James and the girl next door is left in limbo.

In New York Kildare meets the famed Dr. Gillespie (Lionel Barrymore) who seems to immediately dislike him, he gets blamed for negligence that caused the death of a famous politician that was not his fault, AND he has a clue as to why a wealthy family's grown daughter tried to commit suicide. The hospital wants him to say what he knows, but he feels what he was told by her was in confidence and faces being fired for insubordination because he stays mum, figuring he can figure out the mystery himself and maybe save the girl's mind and spare her any embarrassment. It's funny how the hospital, the girl's family, and the specialist all feel like they have a right to discuss confidential medical information about the grown woman, but never bother to discuss it with her. Kildare is decades ahead of his time, seemingly, in medical ethics.

Not many supporting cast members that were staples of the later films are brought in here, with the exception of the telephone operator and Nat Pendleton's orderly and their long running low key romance.

MGM does something unusual at the end. There is a small segment tacked on where Lionel Barrymore and Lew Ayres mention that this film is the first of a series that will be made.

The Kildare films are especially slick and entertaining for a set of B films- the very genesis of the med-centric programming that has ruled network TV for decades. In fact, if you compare this series with early 2000's TV series "Scrubs", there seem to be lots of comparisons and even direct character-to-character correlations between the two. And with the studio system at full throttle, MGM could throw their stable of talent in as individual "guest stars" in each entry. Barrymore is just terrific in these films as the irascible and somewhat omniscient Gillespie . I'd recommend them as a great time passer. And remember that the key to enjoying these films is to not play 21st century armchair physician here, just sit back and let the drama unfold.

Although Max Brand's character of Dr. James Kildare first appeared over at Paramount's Interns Can't Take Money with Joel McCrea, the first of the classic Dr. Kildare movies was Young Dr. Kildare with Lew Ayres as the idealistic young intern. The series was done over at MGM and that most expensive of all studios gave a polished touch to even a series of B pictures.

Young Dr. Kildare sets the series up with Lew Ayres newly graduated from medical school deciding to intern at Blair General Hospital in New York instead of starting practice over in the small Connecticut town with his parents Samuel S. Hinds and Emma Dunn. While there he comes to the attention of renowned doctor Lionel Barrymore as Dr. Leonard Gillespie who spends the whole film putting him through some paces as he decides whether this young man can cut it as his new assistant.

Although Ayres's main challenge with purportedly mentally ill rich girl Jo Ann Sayers is not terribly convincing in its simplistic approach to her psychiatric problems which resulted in a suicide attempt the sincere playing of Ayres, Barrymore, and the rest cover a multitude of script holes. Walter Kingsford also makes his debut in the series as the officious hospital president Dr. Carew. Although a pattern is set with the Carew character here who realizes he's just a bureaucrat with an MD and he defers to Barrymore on medical questions.

The Kildare series got a decent if not outstanding debut with Young Dr. Kildare.