MEDICINE MAN
A film review by Frank Maloney
Copyright 1992 Frank Maloney
MEDICINE MAN is a film directed by John McTiernan, from a script by Tom Schulman and Sally Robinson. The film stars Sean Connery, Lorraine Bracco. Cinematography is by Donald McAlpine and musical score by Jerry Goldsmith. Rated PG-13 for strong language, nudity.
MEDICINE MAN suffers from two slight weaknesses: clumsy, heavy-handed direction by John McTiernan, who has made his reputation with thrillers like DIE HARD and THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER; and the brainless script by Tom Schulman and Sally Robinson. Schulman, who wrote the script for DEAD POETS SOCIETY, reportedly got $3 million for the story idea. The film overall cost around $40 million dollars. And except for the beautiful location photography, Andrew Vajna, the producer, and Hollywood Pictures, the Disney unit that released it, did not get much for their money.
There is an enormous hole in the plot. The only people who don't see the obvious solution half-way through the film are the two principals, who are supposed the Great Scientists. Instead, they are the Great Clueless. Also, I found the idea that anything could cause tumors to vanish overnight entering the realm of science fiction of a very decidedly non-hardcore type.
Lorraine Bracco, as Dr. Rae Crane and who was an interesting character actress in GOODFELLAS, fails to connect with Sean Connery. Her character is alternately abrasively independent or anachronistically spoiled, withering, a city girl-scientist who screams at snakes and who won't share the swimming hole with the village children. One minute she's demanding to be accepted as Connery's new research assistant, and the next she's demanding to be allow to return to the City. I read that Vajna explicitly said the idea behind the film was to recreate the unique chemistry of the 1951 classic THE AFRICAN QUEEN -- comedy, jungle adventure, and the attraction of opposites. In view of the results, we can safely conclude that Bracco is no Katherine Hepburn.
As for Connery, in the role of Dr. Robert Campbell, this may be his worst film since the 1979 METEOR. It is obvious that he is having no fun with his role, and even more obvious that he is trying to Act. I note that he is credited with being executive producer for this film. Mind you, bad Connery is still pretty good, and he has his moments. But the set-up, grumpy, misogynistic, anti-social, out-of-touch, and over-the-hill boy-genius with an excessive taste for native hootch and angst, is hackneyed and uninspired at best.
The best part of the movie is the work of the cinematographer McAlpine, especially a voyage through the canopy of the rain forest by rope and pulley. Goldsmith's music is pleasant -- a hint of samba played on steel drum.
Overall, I'd recommend that unless you have to see Sean Connery's every movie you would be just as well off to give MEDICINE MAN a miss. Maybe as a cheap video rental, but it is only marginally worth the price of a matinee ticket.
-- Frank Richard Aloysius Jude Maloney .
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