Dr. Dolittle: Tail to the Chief

I'm absolutely hypnotized by the stories that stories make. I often think of stories having their own agency, doing whatever they need to do to survive. That can take one of two paths I think.

The first is the path I normally pay attention to. A story can coax and guide it's tellers and receivers toward paths that matter, that penetrate and dissolve bits of us. These matter, and it's not just interesting to look at what they are and why they affect us, but also how they became so.

And then you have other path, which you could consider the quantity over quality model, where a story evolves so that it can simply be repeated. These reflect rather than make worlds and they thrive on a parasitic energy from other stories. I think that is what we have here.

The Dolittle story in it's basic form has been around for eons I suppose. In films I first encountered it as something which could carry some simple endearments spiced with enough humor to entertain. But that form has no juice today.

So it evolved, attracting Murphy and support to become something more colorfully funny, adapting a raunchy persona. But the fertility fades on that as well.

Now I suppose that there is a branch of evolution for all stories where they end up a Saturday afternoon kids babysitting material. And I suppose that this story already was headed in that direction. But the specific form is interesting at least. It has moved to the "black" theme part of the story ecosphere.

It's a comfortable, secure niche that guarantees longevity and repetition because it links to an audience that uses such stories to define self.

The story form has these elements: the focus is on women and how they make the world right. In every case, there is an environment in which men live and which has a dysfunctional dynamic, needing the common sense of women, common sense that is deeper in the African American woman than anywhere.

The chief character is always the same. Here she has poor grades and a focus on "social skills." she seems inept at first, but her pluck allows a situation in which she can apply her "emotional intelligence" to the problem. It invariably is the result of some family dynamic which incidentally explains deficiencies in our heroine.

She does her stuff and the world is made right, to the befuddled who lack this gift. In this case, it is the president that needs help, and by implication the soul of Africa (literally) that needs to be saved.

An interesting thing here is that the story includes multiple references to endangered species and preserved ecostructure in the context of personal (meaning in this sense, animal) personal inadequacies

Survival folded into survival.

Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.

While this isn't Oscar-worthy, and it will never be nominated for Video of the Year, Kyla Pratt doesn't fail to entertain, in spite of a lax plot so full of holes, it's nearly nonexistent. The dialog is the worst kind of cheese, and the whole execution is completely idiotic. However, the premise is rather cute and amusing, and Kyla Pratt is cute and amusing DOING it. Although suspension of belief is nearly impossible when faced with the horrible dialog and implausible plot elements, contrived story devices, and horrible production quality...and in the face of all that, somehow I don't hate it. That's mainly because of the "cuteness" factor and Kyla Pratt's growing abilities as an actress in spite of the horrible parts she has been shoe-horned into. I liked it...oddly enough.

It rates a 4.2/10 on the Str82Video Scale.

It rates a 3.6/10 on the Movie Scale from...

the Fiend :.

This movie was bad enough for me to want to come onto IMDb and submit my debut review, so here it is: When faced with a family comedy, you'd hope that at least one member of the family audience would laugh a few times. At least. Unfortunately, only two or three times during this movie was there an attempt at humour just funny enough to ALMOST make me smile, or indeed to make the five and seven year olds I watched this movie with almost lift out of the stupor they were thrown into by the horrifying monotony that was Dr. Dolittle: Tail to the Chief. At these moments of near-humour, I would hope that perhaps the movie was improving, but then my foolish optimism would fizzle out again as the movie sank back into its dreary dialogue and dull acting. Of course, the acting isn't something that would be such a big importance in this kind of movie, but here it is so terrible that it is one of the straws that broke the camel's back. I believe this was the fourth film in a series. That fact alone speaks volumes. It was boring in almost every respect and not worth anybody's money or time.

If there's one good thing that can be said about this movie it's that at least Kyla Pratt is dedicated to the character of Maya Dolittle. She debuted as the nerdy animal girl in the first Dr. Dolittle film when she was 12 years old, and ten years later here she still is, playing the character. That is dedication to your craft, and I can respect that.

That being said, this is an awful film. Pratt is actually one of the better actors in this whole lackluster borefest and even she isn't great, merely slightly above average. Though I mostly blame poor writing. None of the jokes are funny, the conflict is laughably out there - and not in a good way - most of the characters have no motivations, backstories or even characteristics. All the animals especially are just bad, being either stereotypical, rude, full of lowbrow humour or all of those at once.

The plot is one of those B-movie comedy plots mainly written to give room for all those wacky characters to spout wacky dialogue and to get into wacky situations. But, as already established, both the dialogues as well as the characters are poorly written and the plot itself is the poorest of them all. One of those three can be poor, and the two might be able to pick up the slack, so you can only imagine what happens when they all fail.

Still, there's really nothing actively harmful in this film. You can see that at least some of the actors believe in their roles and it has a good, if a bit clichéd, message it tries to convey. I guess that if you honestly have nothing else to do, this will pass the time, but I wouldn't recommend it. Kyla Pratt sure is cute, though.

To call this movie lackluster gives the word a bad name. To call it good is an insult to movie goers everywhere. But to call this movie a waste of time is a good starting point.

Somehow, a Dr Dolittle 4 has been made and this time no Eddie Murphy. You probably couldn't pay him to even watch this movie. He probably would rather pick up a transvestite along the side of the road again instead of watch it. Yes it was that bad.

The movie is basically the young Dolittle entering college and only gaining 'temporary admission' and having to show some activity to gain full admission. While that is hogwash, it gets better. PUSA (the President) is inviting over a fake leader of a fake African nation to sign a fake treaty. Yes, some evil logging company wants to destroy the rain forest because thats all they want to do.

Dolittle saves the day with her animal pals. And evil logging is stopped. Everybody get real excited! I really thought this movie should have been cut in funding to see how ingenious they would have to get with real animals. Instead, its not even entertaining. "F"