Dr. T and the Women (2000)

Like much of Robert Altman's work, this is a hit and miss movie, but worth seeing for some good performances, several genuinely funny scenes, and some of the master's typical ensemble sequences with all hell breaking loose while everybody talks at once! It is probably unhelpful to approach it as though it was a full-blooded satire on wealthy Texas women. For a start, the target is too easy - like the floating and walking birds Dr T and his buddies seem to think it's fair to shoot at - and in any case the focus of the film is not the Women of the title, but Dr T.

Richard Gere gives a typically charming and understated, performance as Dr T (for Travis), who is surrounded by women whom he likes and respects in private life, and cares for in his professional life as a gynecologist, but no more understands than most men. Farrah Fawcett gives a touching portrayal as his wife, who retreats into childhood to escape his smothering affection. Helen Hunt, as an independently-minded, intelligent golf pro, provides a refreshing change - both for Dr T and the audience - from the empty-headed shopaholics who people much of the movie. Laura Dern, Kate Hudson and Shelley Long sparkle as, respectively, Dr T's sister-in-law, daughter and receptionist. (As we might expect from Altman, the city of Dallas also plays a leading role; and the best casting is definitely that of Eric Ryan as the "birth baby"; Eric enters the IMDb actors data base at the tender age of zero!)

This is a long way from the vintage Altman of Mash, Nashville and The Player; but is still richer than most Hollywood fare.

Fmovies: If you sit down to this movie expecting your average romantic comedy you're going to come away, as many of the reviewers here did, befuddled and probably seriously disappointed. I'm no high-art film critic, but I had the advance warning, of sorts, of having watched the previews on the VHS edition of this movie (of all things), which let me know not to expect anything ordinary from it. Plus it's Robert Altman, right? So I went into it expecting not to take things at face value -- and that's what you have to do to enjoy this movie. The idea is that you have this man who treats women with love, respect, and chivalry. He is surrounded by demanding women all day long, and yet the focus on the individual patients whose encounters with him we witness shows the truth of something he says to his friends: every woman is unique. And then we see the different ways in which the women respond: His office manager falls in love with him. His patients demand more and more (and are very well-directed). His wife goes insane because she's loved too much (a diagnosis as obviously unrealistic as hers HAS to have been written into the story for a reason). His daughters rely on him, shock him, disappoint him. His sister-in-law takes advantage of his hospitality while drinking herself into a stupor. His girlfriend (who is kind of a man's woman) rejects his chivalrous overtures ("I'll do it! I'll get it!"), is the only self-sufficient woman in the film, and ultimately rejects his offer for an interdependent relationship. All these combine to create a world whose stresses pile up until a surreal conclusion whisks Dr. T away to a completely different world... where straight away he's put back to work, and he delivers a boy. And who can blame him for being relieved.

Overall this is a movie I'm glad I saw once; it was an interesting experience. Kudos to Richard Gere for probably the best acting I've ever seen him do.

Gere appears to be having such a luscious time surrounded by the film's fuzzy sketch of genteel, grotesque, distaff Texas that he's forgotten to be smug. A surprisingly spry and funny film with a solidly serious core. The slightly anachronistic absurdity of the conceit -- the travails of a lone gentleman in a world of ladies -- gives the actors room to do some wonderful work. It was a sweet film with some bizarre touches in its satire of the bourgeois.Dr. T and the Women may put off people who only look for action and a plot-by-numbers storyline, but should be seen by people who crave adventurous film making. Watch it with a open mind.

Dr. T and the Women fmovies. Robert Altman is frustratingly inconsistent, and here is at his worst. His very personal style has three characteristics:

1. Many-threaded storylines and characters, many of which raise questions that are not answered in the play. When done well, you get the impression of moving through the world with a curious voyeurism, dipping into many lives which are intriguing enough to learn more about. Except for the youngest daughter, none of these women are worth digging more into. The misogynism could have been an advantage; here it is cheap.

2. Spontaneous acting. Altman doesn't tell his actors what to do, trusting them to bring something fresh. In the best case, the differing visions of the actors add to the manyhued effect described above. But you need powerful actors like he had in "Cookie's Fortune." These folks, some of whom are fine when given direction, simply can't synthesize.

3. Wonderful tracking shots (which move from character to character so enhance the two effects noted above). Check out the first shot in "The Player." That alone is worth the admission. Here, we have a busily choreographed shot at the beginning and a dizzy pullback at the end, but neither to any useful effect.

Avoid this film. The master was asleep.

`What's up Doc?' I will tell you what is up! Set your appointment book and schedule a visit to see `Dr. T & The Women'- the latest film by Director Robert Altman. Richard Gere stars as a gynecologist who must deal with the neurotic women in his life: a mentally-impaired childlike wife, a witty golf pro mistress, a champagne sipping sister, a lesbian daughter, a kennedy-assassination obsessed control freak daughter, and of course his hypochondriac-impatient patients. The film is full of `altmanrisms'- an overlapping dialogue, a catastrophic occurrence in a public event, and of course satirical viewpoints of a certain profession. Gere saves his career again with a remarkable performance. However, it was Laura Dern's work as the champagne sipping sister that still hungover in my mind after I watched the movie. It was a very critical condition that academy award voters overlooked her brilliant acting. Altman again is able to get some well-known actors to appear in his movies- Farrah Fawcett, Helen Hunt, Tara Reid, Liv Tyler, Kate Hudson, and Shelley Long are the other female players involved in this one. The one headache I had with `Dr T. & The Women' was the somber characterizations of Dr. T's male buddies. These characters should have been rescheduled to another movie. All in all, Director Robert Altman (in my viewpoint one of the smartest directors of all time) was able to complete a successful cinematic operation on `Dr T. & The Women.' So take two hours, go see this movie, and call me in the morning. **** Good

This is only the second time I've been irritated enough to write a review, the other was "Trixie."

First of all, I'm a fan of "The Player" and of "Short Cuts," among other Altman movies. So when I was at first annoyed and angered by the beginning of this movie, I passed it off to his soon-to-come deeper agenda, which in "Dr. T..." never arrives.

I loathe this movie. Let me count the ways:

1. (Most importantly) We are led to empathize with a man who believes he loves too much, too hard, and hence, the consequences. This, if played out, would be great, as he gets his come-uppance, realizes the self-delusion and that his life and ways with women is a lie. But that's not what happens. We are supposed to feel sorry for and sympathize with him the entire way, even as he cheats, avoids true responsibility and, despite what the ending is supposed to say, never changes. Rather than the boy-birth being a sign of evolution/change/enlightenment, it debunks all that came before, in fact saying that all these women were the problem all along. Instead of being a witty examination of flawed Dallas women, it concludes with a tacked-on non-epiphany, which by its very existence makes everything before it misogynistic, and none of the characters likeable.

2. Watch how many times Altman works in gratuitous nudity, like an 11 yr. old peeping tom. When he shows Janine Turner's derriere-crack, at the end of her scene, it's not Richard Gere following it with his eyes, it's the CAMERA, as if to say, "hey, look at this" -- like a little elbow in our sides.

3. He does the same thing often at the end of scenes, swinging the camera with a wink to pick up a sign, a heavy-handed metaphor or scene-link that is beginning film school pretentious artifice at its worst.

4. The editing and cinematography again is of the film-school variety, and at often times is like a rough cut.

5. Helen Hunt, who for years has been trying to convince us she's newly "sexy," is so self-conscious that we never can buy into any kind of character. I am sick of her flinging her hair.

6. The camera holds so long on the golf sequences, as if to say - "these actors really can play golf," which they really don't very well. But it becomes a call-attention lingering as opposed to a mere setting for dialogue.

7. The overly intrusive soundtrack by Lyle Lovett may be close to the worst in history. Not only does it blot out large sequences of dialogue, and call attention to itself mindlessly at every turn, it actually has lyrics which say exactly what's going on in the scene.

8. The writing and dialogue are extremely sophomoric; very few times do the people seem real in what they're saying, and often they resort to movie cliche-speak.

9. Gere has a few good real moments, but the direction hurts him as well.

10. Altman's trademark "everyone speaking at once," in this movie is contrived and annoying.

11. (And maybe worst of all) this movie made me replay all the movies of Altman that I really like and see that many of tendencies above that I criticize are prevalent in ALL of his movies, now tempering my enjoyment of them. I now see a old lecher with a misogynistic bent and an arrested development, calling attention to his weaknesses in a pretentious and juvenile way.