Surprisingly incoherent and boring

Pretty Good

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

I'm truly surprised that The Doctor got no Oscar nominations. Maybe because it tells some uncomfortable truths about death, dying, and the medical profession. And William Hurt in the title protagonist role was certainly Oscar worthy.Hurt is a successful surgeon with all the perks that his high priced profession can give him. He has a wife, Christine Lahti and a child and lives more than comfortably. Hurt also enjoys the perks of playing God with people's lives as doctors certainly do.That all changes when Hurt is discovered to have a malignant growth in his throat. Then he becomes a patient and sees from that point of view how some in his profession treats whom it is supposed to serve.The real eye opener is Hurt meeting a terminally ill Elizabeth Perkins who is facing death with as much fear and trepidation as most of us would be doing. Hurt learns a few life lessons from her.Another performance of note is that of colleague Mandy Patinkin who Hurt sees a reflection of his former self and truly grows to despise. Still Patinkin treats the people he serves like so much cattle, I doubt he'll ever get it.Hurt is also a teaching resident in his hospital and in the end you really wish that hospitals make what he does a general policy for its new interns.The Doctor is a real eye opener of a film. Don't miss it and the Oscar caliber performances of William Hurt and Elizabeth Perkins. A rotten shame they and the film were not nominated.

I really liked this movie. William Hurt was excellent as a cold surgeon, who although excellent as his job, didn't have a lot of beside manner. He didn't realize how he came across to patients and didn't seem to care. However, it all changes when he is diagnosed with cancer and becomes the patient.The movie also deals with the relationship he has with his family. He doesn't have the emotional connections with his wife and son and in fact doesn't even reveal to her that he is sick at first. He also befriends a fellow cancer patient and has feelings for her and his wife notices.When the physician does become the patient, William Hurt finally realizes what patients experience and this makes him a better person, dad, husband and doctor. The movie is uplifting, not overly sentimental and the acting is phenomenal. I love anything Mr. Hurt is in and he doesn't disappoint with his performance.

William Hurt is the happy-go-lucky heart and lung surgeon forced to swallow a bitter pill when he develops a malignant tumor in his throat and suddenly has to face the same impersonal treatment he prescribes for his own patients. The film works best when charting his frustration while looking down the wrong end of the stethoscope, but elsewhere Doctor Hurt's internal struggle toward a more compassionate bedside manner is conveyed through soggy domestic melodrama, with an unnecessary digression into the Nevada desert outside Reno for a pas de deux with terminal brain tumor patient Elizabeth Perkins. The script could easily have been trimmed by twenty pages; it would have been more effective (and certainly more concise) without the predictable marriage crisis. But under Randa Haines' direction the film is, thankfully, more sensitive than sentimental, with a totally convincing (and all too familiar) medical background and a first rate cast to recommend it.

The Doctor may not be the most moving, most influential, or best portrayed movie of all time, but it certainly should rank near the top of the best medical movies of all time. The story is about Dr. Jack MacKee (William Hurt), an arrogant heart surgeon whose believes that doctors should "Get in, fix it, and get out". However, when he finds himself diagnosed with cancer, he must see the system from the other side - a mechanized, unsympathetic system where the patient's comfort is the least concern. The story complicates when he befriends a fellow cancer patient, June Ellis (Elizabeth Perkins), who proves to be an inspirational figure in Jack's battle against cancer.The movie could be deemed a transformation story. At first, Jack is an unlovable character - the doctor we all wish we didn't have. However, as he continues through his ordeal, his attitude begins to change. It is a profound change, and provides for many deep, moving scenes.The story itself is not complicated, and is easy to follow. The acting, however, is top notch, and makes for a terrific movie. I would recommend it to anybody.