Doctor Dolittle (1998)

“John, do me a favor. Don’t ever confide in me. I’m utterly useless in these areas. I’m really a very self-absorbed man.” – Dr. Mark Weller

Number of Times Seen – Twice (10 Oct 2001 and 19 Apr 2020)

Brief Synopsis – A physician discovers that he has the ability to talk with animals and must find a way to prove that he isn’t going crazy.

My Take on it – In my quest to watch more Eddie Murphy films that I’m less familiar with, I decided to see if my memory of this one was still intact.

I didn’t have such fond memories and in my mind the film was klumped (pun intended) together with the Nutty Professor films as being part of Murphy’s career which should go unremembered.

Thankfully, upon rewatching this film, I realized that it was actually a much better film than I had recalled.

Murphy does away with his usual comedic nonsense and actually works well as the title character.

He allows us to believe his predicament and the various scenarios that he gets himself into along the way and the story flows quite well here.

The film sports an amazing voice cast that includes Norm MacDonald, Chris Rock, Albert Brooks, Julie Kavner, Gary Shandling, Ellen DeGeneres and Gilbert Gottfried to name a few.

Most of them do amazing jobs with these characters and help bring these animals to life with the kind of personalities that we would expect from these actors.

There are a few characters that aren’t as interesting and even with familiar voice actors playing the roles, they still leave much to be desired.

The best part of this film tho are the special effects since they allow the interactions with these animals to be more realistic (obviously within the context of this fantasy world) in the various situations that occur.

Bottom Line – This film works better than I would have expected. Murphy works really well in the title role and because he leaves some of his comedic nonsense out of this film, things flow much better. The voice cast of this film is great and we get to hear some great actors portraying many of the animated animals and in some cases the performances are hilarious while in others, it leaves a bit to be desired. The special effects in this film are also great because they do a wonderful job making the animals all seem quite realistic in these kind of situations. Recommended!

MovieRob’s Favorite Trivia – Eddie Murphy is terrified of live animals, and insisted that as many as possible be superimposed digitally in scenes. When he couldn’t avoid acting in the same room as an animal, the shots frequently ended with Murphy screaming. (From IMDB)

Rating – Globe Worthy (7/10)