Dolittle Does Little For The Classic Original

Dolittle

Starring:  Robert Downey  Jr,  Harry Collette, Antonio Banderas.

Directed  by:  Stephen Gaghan

Rating: *(1 star)

Two thoughts struck me as I sat  wide-eyed and open-mouthed(for  all the wrong reasons) watching this monstrous misfire.

What is  Robert Downey Jr doing in Dolittle? It does  little for  him  after Ironman. What was I doing sitting through this trippy trip into tripe?Am I the masochistic  type? Only those addicted to acute self-pain would bear the terrible  computer  graphics that make   monkeys and giraffes talk in celebrity  voices who  must be ruing the day they agreed  to voice  the dummy-graphics, and  Downey  Jr’s  weird accent which makes him sound like an Irishman  gargling with marbles at the Scottish seaside.

To put it  bluntly, Downey Jr is  terrible as  the  fabled Dr Dolittle who has a special ability.

 No,  he can’t make   a bad film into good. But  he can converse  with animals. But the animals  look so unconvincing  talking in various  star voices(Rami Malik  who  immortalized himself as Freddy Mercury speaks  for  a gorilla,and that speaks for itself) I felt  I was  watching two  films, one on the soundtrack where some  really sturdy  voice performances were  played out, and  the other  on screen where the computer-generated animals  competed with  human actors for  this years Razzies.

The  film is  a disaster on every level. As  the umpteenth rendering  of a classic  story it does  great  disservice  to those of us who grew  up reading Hugh Lofting’s  evergreen novel,   and  to  the  1967  film where Rex Harrison  played the  title role.

This  is  the  second film in a month with talking animals. Between Cats and Dolittle, we cover the entire  dismaying gamut from the  devil  to  the deepblue sea.