Quattro in medicina

Watching Doctor In The House which was the first in the Doctor Simon Sparrow series that was a standby for Dirk Bogarde it put me in mind of the American film Not As A Stranger which came out the following year. Both films dealt with medical students and their training. While the American film was quite serious and quite good this film overed a lot of the same ground.

Bogarde's Dr. Sparrow is an earnest and serious character who just keeps falling into comic situations that seem to find him. This is a funny film, but Bogarde plays it absolutely serious as he did in the whole series and the comedy just plays off him.

Kenneth More who is his best friend plays it far more laughs. If you see Not As A Stranger note Robert Mitchum as the lead like Bogarde and More is most like Frank Sinatra who was Mitchum's best friend. The parallels are quite striking.

A lot of familiar faces from British cinema are in the cast. James Robertson Justice of the booming voice is the terror of the students. He takes a special interest in Bogarde though like Broderick Crawford did in Mitchum in Not As A Stranger. Robertson Justice would return in the sequels so popular was his character.

Bogarde who always took on quirky and challenging roles throughout his career always came back to Simon Sparrow. I suspect he liked the money and some of his more challenging parts didn't yield well at he box office.

Doctor In The House holds up well as does the rest of the series I've seen so far.

Doctor In The House was so successful that it spawned not only six sequels (of diminishing quality) but also a television spin-off. Oddly enough this success works against it, as it is easy to forget how good the original was.

Medical school provides a good background for the comedy capers, as well as providing a sound plot structure that some of the sequels lacked.

Dirk Bogarde leads a very strong cast, which includes such familiar British comedy faces as Joan Sims and Shirley Eaton in small roles. Kenneth More provides strong support to Bogarde but the great James Robertson Justice, in his signature role as Sir Lancelot Spratt steals the movie. Despite only appearing in a handful of scenes, Justice dominates the screen, notably in the famous `What's the bleeding time' scene.

Luscious colour photography adds to the enjoyment as the movie delivers a great hour and half of escapist fun, still fresh and breezy after almost fifty years, I'd recommend this move to any one who is interested in British comedy.

John Davis, the dreaded executive producer at Pinewood was so wary of setting a film in a hospital he made the cast wear sports jackets rather than white coats in the publicity pictures; fortunately it went on to be a big hit, and the rest is history.

Lavishly produced, it provides the pleasure of seeing plenty of familiar faces in Technicolor - not to mention Kenneth More's loud waistcoats - recording in colour a London in which people still carried ration books, a phone call cost thruppence and ten quid constituted a hefty fine.

Serving as the ego to the id of the Carry On's, some of whose regulars put in fleeting appearances (including a very young Shirley Eaton bearing very little resemblance to the svelte young sixties chick she ripened into), James Robinson Justice doesn't dominate the proceedings as he later did; while by bizarre coincidence Ernest Clark - who later took over his function as Professor Loftus in the seventies TV spin-off - is also in it.

The lovely Kay Kendal briefly glides through it as a dinner date with a taste for caviare; while Lisa Gastoni also makes an uncredited but striking appearance - first seen in a green leather coat - in a dubbed role as a tart, bespectacled rival student.

Dirk Bogarde was at the height of his matinée idol handsomeness when he made "Doctor in the House," a 1954 film that led to a series of films. It also stars Kenneth More, Kay Kendall, Muriel Pavlow, James Robertson Justice, and Donald Sinden.

The story concerns the hijinks of the young medical students as they flirt with the nurses, attempt to pass their boards (sometimes more than once), drink, and party.

Bogarde is Simon Sparrow, the naive, serious-minded young man who comes into this den of playboys. Everyone is very good, especially James Robertson Justice as Sir Lancelot Spratt, a role he truly made his own.

Bogarde, as always, injects some shyness and gentleness into the proceedings, and his scene with a new young mother when he delivers her baby is especially sweet.

Bogarde had a fascinating career path - he wasn't really interested in being a "movie star," as such, and worked his way into character parts and finally working with directors like Visconti in prestigious, if not widely distributed, films. He also had a very prolific writing career.

If you like these "Doctor" films, this one is probably the best, so you're sure to enjoy it.

Were this med-school frolic made today, I expect the raunch factor would top out at 10. But this is 1954, and there are still limits, and something quaint called "good taste". As a result, the humor depends more on character and tempting the limits than it does on bedpans and tossing limits aside. The laughs come less from the obvious or outrageous, and more subtly from situations and wit (except for the street chase, which really doesn't come off that well). True, the movie may be no knee-slapper, but neither does it cause indigestion afterwards.

Well, you do have to accept that these 30-somethings are still young enough to be starting med-school, something of a stretch. Nonetheless, Bogarde and Co. come through as a likable crew, and I think I'll get sick on the off-chance that the cute little number Muriel Pavlow will be my nurse. Too bad we don't see more of that gifted and sexy comedienne Kay Kendall. I love the way she snubs Houston after he makes an untoward remark-- what a classy looking gal who died much too young. And, of course, there's the imperious James Robertson Justice looking and sounding like Emperor of the Universe, but really a regular guy when the chips are down.

I like the way the unassuming Sparrow (Bogarde) comes to a sense of confidence and pride after delivering his first baby. It's his first case and now, after all the training and sacrifice, he departs the house, a real doctor. What a fine, versatile actor Bogarde was. Anyway, the movie holds up pretty well, a nice balance of the antic and the affable.