Cheap The Hospital (DVD) (George C. Scott, Diana Rigg) (Arthur Hiller) Price

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CULT MOVIES 36
36. THE HOSPITAL (comedy, 1971) A series of emergencies has gripped NY's Manhattan Hospital. Patients are dying left and right due to overcrowded conditions, and the staff's ineptitude when dealing with them. When a resident doctor is caught up in the death count the chief medical examiner, Dr. Bock (George C. Scott), is called in to investigate. Having worked as a doctor for too many years, and having family problems of his own, Dr. Bock finds it difficult to deal with everything else. He decides to commit suicide. But then he meets Barbara (Diana Rigg), a young-hippie beauty, who's mentally ill father she wants to take home. Her perceptive insights on life makes Dr. Bock fall in love with her, thus reexamining his life.

Critique: Black comedy features a 'tour-de-force' performance from veteran actor George C. Scott. He's good at playing high-strung, serious characters whose strict morals are severely tested. First half of the film unfolds like a melodrama, giving a pretty good account of hospital life, and the shambles they sometimes are. But then, as things look set for a dramatic climax it skews into slapstick comedy. If Paddy Chayefsky's script had maintained its dramatic feel I wonder if Scott would've walked out with the best Actor Oscar. His breakdown (suicide) scene is one of the most gut-wrenchingly real in cinema history.

QUOTE: Dr. Bock: ". . .last night I sat in my hotel room reviewing the shambles of my life and contemplating suicide. I said 'no Bock don't do it. You're a doctor, a healer, you're a necessary person, you're life is meaningful'. Then. . .I find out that one of my doctors was killed by a couple of nurses. . .how am I to sustain my feeling of meaningfulness in the face of this?"

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A CURE FOR WHAT AILS YA....
If you ever were scared of hospitals.. DONT SEE THIS MOVIE.. it will only reinforce those fears.. Paddy Chayefsky outdoes himself in this awesome story of bungling, machination and hospital ineptitude. George C. Scott is his confused, overworked and missunderstood best, Diana Rigg as a fast thinking daughter of a wacked out old man convinced he is the "Paracleet of Kaborka (just what is that anyway?), the Wrath of the Lamb, the Angel of the Bottomless Pit.. etc. etc."
Kudos to the performances of: Barnard Hughes, Nancy Marchand(Lou Grant)and Richard Dysart (St. Elsewhere, LA Law).

And special kudos to Frances Sternhagen.. "Dr Spezio..Dr. Spezio..his chart is not filled out..."

And the best line in the whole film.. "...where do your nurses get their training..Dachau!!!?"

See it, buy it, live it, but don't get sick..who know's what name bracelet you could end up with..

DF

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Schizoid
Schizophrenic film that can't decide whether it's Playhouse 90 or Airplane!. In one corner are Scott and Chayevsky making with the intense psychological realism and some really powerful moments; in the other is chaotic urban hospital laboring at zany gallows humor with a few scattered laughs. In between is director Hiller hoping for single workable whole. Result is awkward pastiche that doesn't live up to super-rich potential. Film is object lesson in how miscasting of even top-notch talent can produce disappointment. I keep wishing gifted amateurs like Zucker Bros. & Jim Abrams had gotten hold of idea first. Sure, Scott is great actor, but he's so authentic he overwhelms ambient efforts at satire; yes, Chayevsky gets off some good lines, but keeps piling on the prose long after it's peaked out. What the movie really needs are more sight gags and a lot less talky angst. In short, let the visuals carry the message -- something word fiend Chayevsky could never allow. My advice: once hippie chick Rigg starts bragging about Scott's restored virility, switch off, because it's a downhill ride from there.