Doctor at Large

"Doctor at Large" is the third installment of the "Doctor" series, with Simon Sparrow (Dirk Bogarde), losing a higher level position at St. Swithins, tries out several other scenarios where he can practice.

This is a very light film, without much plot, except that Simon comes up against Benskin (Donald Sinden), his rival at St. Swithins, who gets the position that Sparrow wanted. It's humorous without being riotous. The best scene for me was when Simon and Nan McPherson (Shirley Eaton) stay overnight at an inn. The proprietress puts them on different floors, and when Simon attempts to sneak downstairs into Nan's room, the woman comes out into the hall. "I was looking for the bathroom," he says. "It's on your floor," she says. "The door is marked 'Bathroom.'" Then she sits in the hall, thus thwarting further attempts.

The cast is good, and Muriel Pavlov is back as Joy. It's really interesting to see Bogarde in this type of film, for which he is so well known, as he spent much of his career doing dark roles in deeper films: "The Servant," "The Night Porter," Death in Venice," and "Victim," to name only a few. The commercial cinema traded on his matinée idol looks; but his heart was elsewhere. Nevertheless, he handled this type of film very well, giving the character a gentleness that people like to see in a real doctor. I think it's a riot that when he appeared in Shaw's "Doctor's Dilemma" on film, the British audience steered clear when they found out it wasn't part of the "Doctor" series. Obviously, these films are beloved, particularly in England.