Dolittle review: An awful film in which Robert Downey Jr gives one of his worst performances


Dolittle                                                                                             Cert: PG, 1hr 41mins 

Rating:

Until 2008, Robert Downey Jr was best known as the troubled actor who failed to live up to the precocious Oscar-nominated promise he demonstrated in Chaplin and came close to wrecking his career with drugs. 

And then along came Tony Stark, aka Iron Man, shortly followed by Sherlock Holmes for Guy Ritchie and a star was well and truly reborn. For the decade or so that followed, the once-again great man – unrivalled master of muttering dialogue at machine-gun speed – could do no wrong.

All that, however, changes with Dolittle. Yes, less than a year after the aptly named Avengers: Endgame, he gives one of the worst performances of his career in a film that may make a few small children giggle (forgive them, they know no better) but disappoints on so many levels.

Robert Downey Jr gives one of the worst performances of his career in Dolittle which disappoints on many levels & makes Rex Harrison’s much-derided 1967 effort look like a classic

Robert Downey Jr gives one of the worst performances of his career in Dolittle which disappoints on many levels & makes Rex Harrison’s much-derided 1967 effort look like a classic

For a few brief moments there is hope, as we realise that Hugh Lofting’s much-abused children’s classic has been returned from the modern-day setting that marked Eddie Murphy’s two versions (1998 and 2001) to a cod-Victorian era more in line with the books.

Then we see that Downey Jr is intent on playing the physician who famously learned to speak to the animals as a mad, inexplicably Welsh-accented recluse, and that most of said animals will be delivering their lines in contemporary American street-talk, and all hope is already lost.

It’s difficult to know which is worse – Downey’s performance or Stephen Gaghan’s dual role behind the camera as both director and co-writer. 

It’s difficult to know which is worse – Downey’s performance or Stephen Gaghan’s dual role behind the camera as both director and co-writer

It’s difficult to know which is worse – Downey’s performance or Stephen Gaghan’s dual role behind the camera as both director and co-writer

The former is more of a non-performance really, made up of a ridiculous Welsh whisper (possibly borrowed from his Port Talbot-raised co-star, Michael Sheen), silly hair that may once have belonged to Captain Jack Sparrow from Pirates Of The Caribbean, and a frock coat that makes Dolittle look like a cross between the Mad Hatter and Willy Wonka.

As for Gaghan, hitherto best known for serious films such as Syriana and Traffic, he demonstrates almost zero talent for making a good children’s film. The pace is tiringly frantic, the charm low and the humour low-brow and lavatorial. A hare sniffs: ‘I think Dr Dolittle did a little do-do.’ Really?

Yes, what plays out has been rightly stripped of Lofting’s racism, but in its place are an unnecessary romantic subplot, a chimp pointlessly transformed into a gorilla and Downey Jr littering his dialogue with toe-curling ‘boyos’ and ‘fair plays’. With not a pushmi-pullyu in sight, it makes Rex Harrison’s much-derided 1967 effort look like a classic.

 

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