The Secret of Dr. Kildare

The third movie in the wonderful Dr. Kildare series from MGM finds Jimmy Kildare (Lew Ayres) trying to help a rich man's daughter who's having some kind of psychological problems that have led to a case of hysterical blindness. Meanwhile, Kildare must also deal with both his father (Samuel S. Hinds) and mentor, Dr. Gillespie (Lionel Barrymore), having illnesses. Gillespie's still fighting his cancer and refusing to rest. Kildare, Sr. is visiting a heart specialist without telling Jimmy.

Ayres and Barrymore are both great. Barrymore's Gillespie gives some tough love to an alcoholic with one of my favorite outbursts of his ("If you drink, it's your own fault and you can't blame your poor ancestors!"). The cast of regulars, including Laraine Day and Nat Pendleton, are terrific. None of them hit a bad note. Pretty Helen Gilbert is the girl with hysterical blindness. She does fine. Lionel Atwill is somewhat wasted as her father. I kept expecting to find out her condition was caused by some mad science experiment of his but, alas, no such luck. Sara Haden and Grant Mitchell also appear in small roles.

It's not the strongest entry in the series but it is enjoyable. One interesting tidbit is that Gillespie refers to hospital head Dr. Carew (Walter Kingsford) as the best doctor in the hospital. Carew is usually displayed in the series as more of a bureaucrat than a competent doctor, let alone 'the best.' It was a nice touch for them to add a layer to the character, even if it's little more than lip service.

The very watchable Dr. Kildare series is a refreshing and smart reality check for the matinee crowd, then as now, and has wisely been noted by others as a precursor to the modern medical TV dramas. But the one thing that spoils these otherwise well balanced (drama/wit/intellect) and well paced stories is the Conover character played by George Reed in this forced black stereotype "Amos and Andy" patronizing manner, instead of in the normal, everyday, regular guy way of talking, like the rest of the cast. Even the "Irish" bartender bit got over played racially in the series. You have to tell yourself this is the product of the times, but were all movie directors 'that' insensitive in the 1930's? Oh well, it is what it is, but it could have been much, much better without the negative racial portrayals.

In real life if Donald Trump had a daughter like Helen Gilbert with all kinds of ailments we would be catering to her I have no doubt the way Walter Kingsford as head of Blair General Hospital is catering to Gilbert's father Lionel Atwill. Of course Kingsford turns the problem over to Lionel Barrymore who in turn gets Lew Ayres to do the actual work.

Which consists of being introduced as an eligible young man by Atwill to his daughter and Ayres to start dating her up to observe her behavior from a medical perspective. You know that's going to cause a problem for Ayres because his relationship with nurse Laraine Day who was introduced to the Blair General Hospital staff and the Dr. Kildare series in the previous film.

Best thing about a somewhat silly episode is the performance of Grant Mitchell as a quack doctor who Gilbert gets involved with. The Dr. Feelgood of his time.

In 1939's "The Secret of Dr. Kildare," the young doctor is faced with a tough decision. Dr. Gillespie's cancer has exacerbated, and he cannot continue his lab experiments as he once did. Of course, he's refusing to stop. So Kildare quits, knowing Gillespie can't do the work without him. He takes over instead the care of a young woman, Nancy Messenger (Helen Gilbert), who has some emotional issues. Her father (Lionel Atwill) isn't sure what to do about her, so Kildare gains her confidence and tries to get to the bottom of her problems. Meanwhile, Kildare's parents (Samuel S. Hinds and Emma Dunn) come to visit. It turns out that the senior Dr. K has a potentially terminal heart problem and has come to New York for a second opinion. This, too, is a Secret of Dr. Kildare - because he doesn't tell his son.

What made this series a great success was the interrelationships of the characters. Lionel Barrymore is a great Dr. Gillespie, and his relationship with Kildare, with his head nurse, Molly Byrd (Alma Kruger) and Dr. Carew (Walter Kingsford) are lively ones of affection cut with bellowing. Laraine Day is Mary Lamont, who's in love with Kildare, but things haven't really heated up between them yet. She, too, has her moments with Gillespie. At one point while recuperating from a weak spell, he asks her to order him a steak, baked potato and apple pie. Lamont never changes expression, picking up the phone to get him gruel and weak tea.

Though the plot line involving Nancy Messenger is oversimplified and not terribly realistic, this is nevertheless a good episode in the Kildare series. Some trivia - Helen Gilbert, who plays Nancy, in real life was married for one year to gangster Johnny Stompanato, Lana Turner's boyfriend who was killed by her daughter Cheryl.

Lionel Barrymore ("Dr. Gillespie") and Lew Ayres ("Dr. Kildare") are teacher and pupil in this competent medical drama. The former is working himself too hard trying to get to the root causes - and therefore to develop a treatment for - pneumonia. The latter is working with the daughter of one of America's wealthiest men (Lionel Atwill) who seems to be suffering from a sort of psychological illness derived from some incident from her past. Barrymore is great as the curmudgeonly, wheelchair-bound physician and he has some fun set-piece skirmishes with head nurse "Molly" (Alma Kruger); otherwise it is only really remarkable as an obvious precursor to not only the "Dr. Kildare" television series' but to episodic medical programming in general.