Rating: 
Summary: One of my favorite films
Review: "The Doctor" is one of my favorite films. I have seen it maybe 10 times (on VHS) and know much of it by heart. There is nothing artificial about this film. It is a human story about real people, well directed and edited, and with sincere, fleshed-out performances from everyone in the cast. At the opening we see the successful heart surgeon Dr. Jack McKee, quite full of himself, performing another major operation while "Let's Get Drunk and Screw" plays in the background. We see him as he makes his rounds, failing in his attempts to interact on a human level with his patients, substituting crude attempts at humor for genuine compassion. We see him failing at home as well, as his professional life alienates him from his wife and son. All this begins to change when a seemingly minor throat irritation is diagnosed as laryngeal cancer. Then he learns what it is like to be on the other side of the medical profession, and it changes his life. William Hurt, a fine but perhaps somewhat limited actor, is perfect as Jack McKee, and he is wonderfully supported by Christine Lahti, who plays his wife, and Elizabeth Perkins, who gives an amazing performance as June, a young woman with a grade 4 brain tumor who has a powerful impact on Hurt's character. June and Jack share a scene in the desert at sundown that gives me a lump in the throat every time. Also worth mentioning are Wendy Tewson, who plays a rather nasty ENT surgeon who gives Jack a dose of his own medicine (so to speak), and Adam Arkin as Dr. Eli Blumfield, "the Rabbi", who has often been the butt of Jack's humor around the hospital, because he talks to his patients while they are anesthetized. The Doctor is a film that illustrates the importance of treating people as human beings and not as objects or numbers on a chart. Highly recommended! (I've pre-ordered the DVD too.)
Rating:
Summary: Powerful
Review: A powerful movie of an insensitive surgeon who is moved to become a compassionate doctor after he is treated for cancer. All health workers should see this film. My wife recently died of cancer after a three year battle with the disease. We experienced the good, the bad, and the ugly in healthcare. The film was realistic in its portrayal of healthcare from the patient's perspective.
Rating:
Summary: A dose of your own medicine
Review: After getting over the initial shock of seeing half the cast of Chicago Hope (when it was still a good show...and not the pale imitation of itself that it later became: Alan Arkin, Mandy Patinkin, Christine Lahti), this movie evolves into a fine, quiet, character driven drama. There are no great heroics, apart from June (Elizabeth Perkins), and even those are real, not manipulative, cliched, corny or obvious. This is a movie that works to develop its characters and plot simultaneously and without artifice or obvious (groanable/cringe inducing) plot devices. None of them are in anwyay what you would call 'extreme' or cliched. They are just very normal people placed is a very stressful situation- the doctor being diagnosed with a growth in his throat and the changes in many lives this growth causes. The changes are both good, bad and 'educational' for most of them. The subplot- hospitals, statistics, malpractice cases, protecting each other- is subdued, never moralized or sermonized on but explored in a way whereby you can make your own judgements, based on some realistics situations (imagine a situation where somebody's life was worth less than $1000). The cast compliment each other and really connect. This movie is quite subtle at times and doesn't use in your face methods to make a point. This is a movie then that is honest, beautifully made, accessible and at times really funny, and at times really raw and saddening. It isn't an episode of ER. So if you're looking for high medical drama look elsewhere. But if you're looking for real multi-layered human drama then look here. Honesty is the key word and theme in the movie (which if you watch it you'll understand what I mean). Honesty to oneself, others and just to the concept in general. And how too, sometimes we find spiritual and psychological 'healing' in the midst of the greatest physical peril. The DVD contains no special features, only the movie, scene selection and set-up. Though it was made in 1990, it doesn't look too dated (apart from the cell-phones). I have to admit watching this movie, I looked at the clock on the DVD player and actually hoped it wouldn't end. How many movies can you say that about? I think the best moment in the story is when the doctor reads the story June gave him. I think there is a lesson in that that is relevant to all of us. Hopefully you'll get the opportunity to see what I mean by watching this movie. SO in all, a brilliant, engrossing, poignant and real human drama built around believeable characters doing normal things and suffering typical tragedies that are enormous in our own lives. These are people we can understand and relate to, not the superficial and stereotypical larger-than-life, weirder-than-fiction characters designed to play with our minds and strum on our heartstrings. These people do touch your heart and mind for the right reasons...And maybe, if only for a moment, it causes you to question and reassess how you deal with others and the face you present the world, then maybe it has helped heal you a little bit too...If you need it, as most of us do.
Rating:
Summary: "Every doctor becomes a patient"...
Review: and that is what happens to Dr. Jack McKee. He's a rather unfeeling member of the medical profession, who believes strongly in not getting close to a patient. When he is diagnosed with throat cancer, he gets to experience what it is like to be scared after learning; be annoyed while waiting for other docs to get to him; fill out forms he just completed earlier in another part of the hospital & feel vulnerable while in one of those awful gowns (etc.) Jack becomes close to a woman who is also undergoing radiation treatment and she really helps him mend his ways. This film is important to me. Ten years ago, I was diagnosed with a condition that required my numerous hospital stays...MRI scans...radiation treatments...and enabled me to see that there really are too many callous -- even cruel -- health care workers. They kept on coming, and it's enough to get you to care less and less about yourself and even refuse other treatment.
Knowing that all these folks who were mean to me throughout my treatments will someday be on the opposite end gives me some comfort. Every doctor should see this movie, based on a book written by a doctor ("A Taste Of My Own Medicine") that I recommend, too. An emotional, well-done movie that I am glad was made.
Rating:
Summary: Moral, moving, and marvellous movie...
Review: Every doctor - and every patient! - should see this movie; the difference is that, not all doctors will understand *why* they should see it.. I use The Doctor when teaching my medical students how to avoid becoming a certain kind of doctor; the kind who is so detached from humanity that they never feel anything of the pain, fear - and the hope - that their patients feel. They have forgotten how to care, and they don't care to remember it. This is a film about a medical `Everyman`; Jack (played by William Hurt with great integrity and skill)is redeemed as a human being - and as a doctor - by his own experience of serious illness, and by that of his friend - her death frees him from the blinkers of self-absorption. The scene where the two of them dance in the Nevada desert is breathtaking. Supporting cast are excellent; especially Mandy Patinkin as Jack's unscrupulous surgical partner. Jack's initially dysfunctional family life is a central part of this movie, and the roles of his wife and son are well played. The last scenes are amongst the best; especially where Jack is explaining to his interns why they are going to spend the next 24 hours not as doctors, but as hospital patients - wearing hospital gowns, undergoing all the appropriate tests, and (horror of horrors) eating hospital food. The following and final scene is simply beautiful, as Jack stands on the roof of the hospital and dances by himself, revived and renewed. Anyone involved in medical or healthcare education should have this video - and use it! Others should watch it to understand better what can happen to medical students along the way to becoming doctors.
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Summary: To BAD this is a GREAT movie!
Review: Everyone who is involved with health care (espically Dr's and Nurses) must see this movie. It should be a requirement for graduation from Medical or Nursing school...........
Rating:
Summary: Must See!
Review: Everyone who is involved with health care (espically Dr's and Nurses) must see this movie. It should be a requirement for graduation from Medical or Nursing school...........
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Summary: music
Review: hello i am trying to find the artist that sang the song WHY DONT WE GET DRUNK AND SCREW, the song in the movie the doctor, while william hurt was on the operating table, please advise, and where i might get a copy of the song, thanks carolyn
Rating:
Summary: Need to be re-released!
Review: I am a Doctor (General Surgeon) and loved "The Doctor". I can not understand why it is not available any more. Every one that deals with patients should watch it. It need to be re-released in VHS and DVD.
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful, enlightening
Review: I am a health care worker, a nurse and a respiratory therapist and we some times forget what its like to be on the other side of the bed. This movie should be a must for everyone in the heath care field. It should be required for any type of health care school. Also the guy singing the song is Jimmy Buffet.
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