Doc Hollywood

Plot synopsis:
Dr. Benjamin Stone is a promising young surgeon working in Washington, D.C. with plans of making more money working for a Beverly Hills plastic surgeon. On his last day, he realizes that none of his colleagues care enough about him to say good-bye to him, instead leaving him a cake with an insult made out of icing.
Driving out west in a 1956 Porsche 356 Speedster, Stone swerves to miss a cow on the highway and crashes uncontrollably into the fence of a local resident in the rural hamlet of Grady, South Carolina. The resident is local Judge Evans, who sentences him to community service at the nearby hospital as punishment rather than allow Stone pay for the fence with cash. Defeated and stranded due to the damage to his car, Ben reports to the local clinic, where Nurse Packer further humbles him by recording his community service hours by clocking him in and out, like a factory worker.
Though upset, Ben makes friends with Mayor Nick Nicholson, who is also the owner of the town's cafe, and Melvin, the local mechanic tasked with repairing his car. Ben soon finds the clinic work is more laid-back than the emergency room to which he is used with simple cases, such as spots before the eyes of an elderly patient not cleaning her glasses, fishing hook impaling and even reading mail for a young illiterate couple, Kyle and Mary Owens, whose baby he later delivers.
The small-town experience soon humbles Ben when he misdiagnoses a young boy as having mitral valve regurgitation leading to late cyanosis, a case the town's curmudgeonly doctor, Aurelius Hogue, treats with a Coca-Cola. Hogue explains that the boy had chewed his father's tobacco and was given too much bismuth subnitrate as an antacid, causing a blue tinge; the carbonic acid component of the soda would relieve his stomachache. The two finally bond when Ben saves Hogue after he suffers a near-fatal heart attack. Since Hogue is eager to retire, Ben is urged by the locals to stay and replace him, although he is tempted by his budding romance with a tomboyish ambulance driver, Vialula, better known as "Lou," a single mother to a four-year-old named Emma. Ben soon confides to her that he grew up in a small town in rural Indiana, where his parents lived and died, and how he can't see himself confined to a small town.
Lou is also pursued by Hank Gordon, a local insurance salesman. He waits for Ben at the mayor's lakeside lodge, where Ben has been staying. Ben expects a fight, but Hank explains that though he can't give Lou what Ben can, he's still a better man for her. After the two men talk, Ben comes to realize he's not selfless enough for a life with Lou and plans to not see her anymore. Ben is soon pardoned from community service for saving Hogue, allowing him to head to California for his job interview. With his car fixed, he tries to sneak out of town, but his departure is delayed when he finds Kyle and Mary Owens stranded by the side of the road with Mary in deep labor. While he's delivering their baby, a tractor trailer smashes into his Porsche and he must leave town without it: the entire town comes to see him off in a taxi.
On the West Coast, Ben's new boss, Dr. Halberstrom, hires him at the interview, based on an unexpected recommendation from Hogue. However, Ben soon tires of the superficiality of Beverly Hills, even going so far as calling to check the weather in Grady on his phone. The next day, he's surprised to receive a message at work from a woman with a "heavy Southern accent" and rushes to a restaurant, where he noticed his restored Porsche in the parking lot. Nancy Lee, the mayor's daughter, and Hank have come to California, and Hank tells Ben he took his own advice to "do what a man's gotta do." Ben returns to Grady, hoping to patch things up with Lou, who takes him back.

Tags: comedy, boring

Review:
This will be a shame, as Fox has been an ingratiating, very enjoyable actor to watch, in most of his films, and DOC HOLLYWOOD is one of his best roles.As breezy, fast-talking Washington, D.C. surgeon Dr. Ben Stone, who dreams of making big money doing plastic surgery in Hollywood, but finds his true calling as a general practitioner in a small southern hamlet, Fox is so 'right' that you can't imagine any other actor in the role.
After a minor traffic accident enroute to California forces him to do 'public service' in fictional Grady, South Carolina, taking on much of the workload of a crusty old local physician (the always enjoyable Barnard Hughes), Stone becomes the 'talk' of the town, and rustic but wise Mayor Nick Nicholson (David Ogden Stiers, in one of his most engaging performances), starts 'selling' the joys of country life to the cosmopolitan young doctor.
A quilt with 'magical' powers provides a nude vision of the girl he's destined to love, 'Lou' (Julie Warner), who turns out to be working at his office; his hormone-fueled pursuit of her, and her pragmatic 'indifference' to his flirtations make their gradual romance edgy and fun to watch.In a town full of colorful characters, two 'stars in the making' stand out; Woody Harrelson, as 'Lou's' suitor, Hank Gordon, a country variation of his bartending character from 'Cheers', talks dumb but has a knack for selling, only lacking a place to make big money at it; and Bridget Fonda, as Mayor Nicholson's oversexed but 'out of place' daughter, hopes Stone will take her away to the bright lights of Hollywood.
Both stars are terrific in their supporting roles, and show the charisma that would lead them to stardom.DOC HOLLYWOOD is full of charming vignettes, from Stone vicariously reading the mail for an illiterate farm couple, to being paid for services rendered with a rather large pig, who ultimately becomes his 'pet'.
The film abounds in warm comic touches that are guaranteed to bring a smile!With a very funny cameo by George Hamilton, as the Hollywood plastic surgeon Stone dreams of working with, DOC HOLLYWOOD hits all the right notes for a terrific entertainment.
I didn't like Doc Hollywood the first time I saw it in 1991 --- then I watched it again a few years ago and was blown away by the writing, acting and all-around sweet nature of the film.
Dr. Ben Stone is leaving DC for a job doing plastic surgery for celebs in LA when he runs into a picket fence in a small Southern town and has to do 3 days of community service at their clinic as penance.
This movie is great because it is about many people deciding for themselves how they want to live -- whether in a big city or in a small town -- and why they value what they do.
Fox plays a hard charging Dr. Ben Stone, with David Ogden Stiers giving a world class performance as the small town mayor that needs a new doctor, and also knows a thing or two about happiness.And then there is Nurse Packer who believes in procedure and punchcards, Julie Warner providing a memorable 'swimming' performance, fishing without hooks, the squash festival, a great rendition of Patsy Cline's "Crazy", and of course, the Pakistani.Way underrated movie that stands up over time.9 out of 10.
Small town Southern judge holds Fox hostage and orders him to work off the damage by helping out the local doc, well-played by Hughes.
Fox does a good job in the lead role, and there are great character turns from Woody Harrelson and Bridget Fonda.
The love story between Fox and Julie Warner is very funny to watch develop and their timing is classic romantic comedy.
While in town Fox locks horns with Woody Harrelson, becomes friends with the priceless Bridget Fonda (who has her eyes on Fox) and falls in love with ambulance driver Julie Warner.
But once I got past those 2 major obstacles and settled in, I found a little gem of a movie.Fox's young doctor, all full of spit and vinegar, sets off across country to medical nirvana: a highly sought  position in a prestigious Beverly Hills plastic surgery practice.
I would definitely recommend this film to anyone that likes stories about the small town lifestyle and romantic comedies.
Admittedly, the premise of Doc Hollywood is more of a sentimental ideal than an actuality: high-powered big city surgeon falls for the charms of a small town full of colourful characters and in need of an old-time country doctor.But Michael J.
It just happens that he plowed into a freshly put up fence by the local judge Roberts Blossom.For the first offense in the town of Grady, Florida Fox is given community service in the local hospital where crotchety old doctor Barnard Hughes is ready to pack it in.
There's one particular citizen played by Julie Warner who wants to offer the ultimate in hospitality even though her ever present steady boyfriend Woody Harrelson is around.In many ways Doc Hollywood is an updated version of the Paramount classic Welcome Stranger with Bing Crosby, Barry Fitzgerald, and Joan Caulfield.
In that one however, the town folks don't take to city boy Bing right away, here they're going out of their way to make Fox welcome as they know that Hughes will not be there forever.One of the really nice things about Doc Hollywood is the impeccable casting of some of the rustic characters you might find in the Florida wilds.
Michael J Fox does an excellent job in this movie and it is whilst filming Doc Hollywood when he felt his first tremor in his finger leading to Parkinsons Disease.
And it is so underrated!Michael J Fox plays Doctor Benjamin Stone, a plastic surgeon in the big city.
He has a very interesting time in Grady including, dinner with the Mayer, and Lou's very weird hobby, urinating in the woods to scare away the deer from the hunters, Ben reluctantly joins in!Ben's beloved car is finally fixed, but will he leave the town for the big city, big job, and big salary, or will he drop it all to stay with the girl he loves?.
Fox earned every penny he got from the industry, and it's with films like this that I feel he is vastly undervalued by the movie watching public.
This cheeky and funny film is criminally rated low for reasons I just can't begin to fathom, it's got a sharp script with a very honest message driving it on.It's concept of putting a big fish in a little pond is always a tale worth telling, and who better than M J Fox to realise the big fish character here?
The supporting cast are just fine here, Julie Warner, Barnard Hughes, Woody Harrelson & Bridget Fonda are all in on the fun, and all of them give performances in keeping with this other side of the fence comedy.
Fox plays a hotshot surgeon on his way to Beverly Hills when he takes a detour that leads to him wrecking his car in a small Southern town.
This leads to many fish-out-of-water situations between the easily-frustrated Fox and the local rubes, as well as his becoming enamored with ambulance driver Julie Warner.Nice comedy helped by a likable cast.
But then there were times when i actually liked it and laughed (a little bit)...Anywayz Doc Hollywood is nothing to rave about, I probably would not see it again, but if there is nothing better to watch on TV then why not?.
Fox plays Dr. Benjamin Stone, who is on his way to Beverly Hills, where he has a well-paid job waiting.He takes a short cut to avoid the traffic jam but hits into a fence in a small town called Grady.He has to do 32 hrs of community service at the hospital.In Grady he meets all these people, like Dr. Aurelius Hogue (Barnard Hughes), Hank Gordon (Woody Harrelson), Mayor Nick Nicholson (David Ogden Stiers), Nancy Lee Nicholson (Bridget Fonda), Judge Evans (Roberts Blossom) and the most interesting of them all, ambulance driver Lou (Julie Warner).George Hamilton plays Doctor Halberstrom.Ben has all the reasons to leave the town as soon as he can, which is harder than he thought, but he also has one good reason to stay.He has strong feelings for the beautiful Lou.So will he leave or will he stay?
Michael Caton-Jones' movie Doc Hollywood is a really nice romantic comedy, and way too underrated, if you ask me.The cast is great.Michael J.
This movie has lots of good stuff.It has the romance thing working, like in the wonderful dancing scene, and it has the comedy thing working as well, the pig is there to prove that.Doc Hollywood may not be a perfect masterpiece, but it is a movie with a heart.And sometimes, that's all we need..
Love the small town movies,I'd Love to live in one.This town used to be small,but now it's competing with Larger towns.Doc Hollywood is a favorite of mine,Because the actors can play small town people,(Like fictional Mayberry.)Big city Doc finds Love in small town.Lou Looks great in the dress and hat,when she's in the Parade,Definitely Someone I would fall for.Great Characters,Typical Small Town Friendly people.Michael Fox is Great in this Movie.Too Big for a small town doc,But finally Fits in .He realizes He Loves Lou,But Leaves To Hollywood ,But Small Towns are far better Than Large Cities.(My Opinion)..
Fox, Julie Warner, Woody Harrelson, Bridget Fonda, David Ogden Stiers, Frances Sternhagen, Barnard Hughes, George Hamilton (Cameo).
Fox stars as a hot-shot young doctor en route to Beverly Hills to become a plastic surgeon when his car winds up in an accident a podunk  country hamlet and winds up stuck for the duration and eventually defrosting his `city folk' demeanor largely thanks to the local colorful eccentrics (that can only be habinated by Hollywood).
Doc Hollywood is a film purpose built to allow Michael J Fox to be likable (if a little smug) in quirky surroundings, it also has some bizarre inexplicable nudity that is odd in what would otherwise be a PG 13 family flick.Fox is Ben Stone, a young hotshot surgeon waylaid momentarily in the sleepy small town of Grady ("Squash capital of the South!") on the way to LA to apply for a more cushy yet higher paid job as a plastic surgeon he also plans to learn to surf.But alas for Stone a fence related automobile accident lands him in trouble, 32 hours of community service as the local doctor's replacement trouble.Now Stone is temporarily locum-ing for a cantankerous long time local doc who is laid up, and while the local townsfolk lay out the red carpet the staff of the hospital do not.
He is given a pig in lieu of payment for his services, has various amusing adventures and encounters with patients and locals including Woody Harrelson as a rival suitor for Lou's affections and all the while the local pageant and highlight of the year is a comin'.This is entirely formulaic fare, but dammit Michael J Fox was just so damn likable at this time of his career that it is hard to well not like him in this.
And because he is the guy on the poster and there are enough cute moments (and unexpected nudity) along the way it makes Doc Hollywood difficult to hate.Even with all that said this was a 5.5 until the final minute or so, in a scene set in LA someone asks "Is that a star?" and Woody Harrelson's character replies offscreen "No, that's Ted Danson".
Fox was in a slew of comedy films between the 80s and 90s, Doc Hollywood was one of the better ones.
No antics or hijinks, but a down to earth film about a young doctor named Ben Stone, who after having an accident, has to become the town doc.
Dr. Hollywood is a great manners comedy,well structured and often funny,but predicable,the characters are colorful and weirds,to star the Mayor a stunning performance,the nurse Parker fantastic biting an old time clock when Doc arrives or leaves the hospital,the pig received as gift from a cured and grateful patient.
Michael J Fox brings a natural charm to his role as the young Doctor who is forced to spend time in the small southern town of Grady (home of the Grady Squash) after knocking down the judges newly built fence.
He is sentenced to community service under the eye of the irrascible Dr Hogue (played with relish by Barnard Hughes)and unexpectedly falls in love - with a woman (Lou the ambulance driver) and gradually the town.The plot's simple,but Fox carries it well,and he's surrounded by a great bunch of quirky characters.Warner is great as the love interest,sexy,tough yet vulnerable,and always believable.It's funny,heart-warming,and thoroughly enjoyable.
It's merely saying that the elements of this film was,to my viewing,more perfect for a continuing story instead of a finite,80/90 minute framing.Another "Fish-out-of-Water" story: Dr.Benjamin Stone(Michael J.Fox),still as pitch-perfect,quasi-yuppiesque yet charming as ever,in what would eventually prove to be a bit of a last hurrah of his film appeal from "Back to the Future")is a rising success as a young doctor/surgeon in a large,east coast city(I cannot immediately recall the city;I want to say Washington D.C. or Philadelphia)who is out to interview for a prestigious opening at a high dollar medical practice in Los Angeles.
What might be equally eye-opening(besides the choice smaller roles that might've come off as almost cameo-like from then rising stars Woody Harrelson and Bridget Fonda,as restless locals)was the not-tapped enough charm of Miss Warner as the love interest or the fine,unaccalimed bow of Barnard Huges and David Ogden Stiers as the town's incumbent doctor and mayor,respectively.A charming,likable show that,if it is able to successfully draw in the viewer,might leave said viewer left wanting perhaps to get more out of this story and these characters.
Here he plays an ego-centric yuppie doctor named Benjamin Stone who is headed for a big payday as a plastic surgeon in Beverly Hills, until he's waylaid in a small southern town (Grady, Georgia) after a minor car accident.
Fox plays arrogant, money obsessed ER doctor Ben Stone, who finds himself stranded in a small rural town after he accidentally crashes into the local Judge's fence.
Here he is Doctor Ben Stone, just finishing his residency at at Washington, DC hospital, anxious to get to Hollywood and start a new job as a plastic surgeon, making the big bucks and having all the beautiful young ladies at his disposal.On the way out west he comes upon a traffic jam at a road construction and, being both impatient and wily, takes a side road, but gets lost in the back woods of small town South Carolina (actually filmed in Central Florida).
Good supporting cast, too -- Woody Harrelson, David Ogden Stiers from "Mash", Bridget Fonda as the girl looking for a way to get out of town, and George Hamilton as the slick Hollywood plastic surgeon..
fox is brilliant at playing doctor in this comedy about a small town doctor wishing to be a plastic surgeon in Hollywood.
However, having viewed it again recently, the very reasons I may have disliked it in the past, are the reasons why I rate is so highly now.Fox is firing on all cylinders as Dr.Ben Stone,who finds himself stranded in a rural town, and gradually transforms from a money obsessed egotist, to a more down to earth nice guy, who realises the things that really matter in life.Julie Warner gives a believable performance as the attractive ambulance driver Lou,who quickly catches Fox's eye in what could very well be the sexiest entrance in a romantic film.The film is Fox's vehicle and is carried by him, but it's to Warner's credit that the scenes between them are evenly matched and she gives a lot more personality to a role which could have easily just been a one dimensional love interest.The dialogue and chemistry between the two of them never seems forced.Of course, like all of these types of films, it's obvious from the start, that the guy will get the girl in the end, but it makes no difference because unlike many similar movies,the relationship seems natural and, to the film's credit, there are a few non-contrived obstacles before the "happy ever after" moment.All in all, I'm glad I saw the film again recently because I found it to be an highly enjoyable, unpretentious ROM-com (how many ROM-Com's show the two leads urinating all over the forest)that delivers a fine set of quirky characters and humorous situations..
Fox, Julie Warner, Woody Harrelson, David Ogden Stiers and Bridget Fonda star in this 1991 romantic comedy.
Fox plays Ben Stone, A plastic surgeon on his way to Beverly Hills who gets into a car accident in a southern town, Grady.
Sophisticated, newly minted cosmetic surgeon Fox) from the big-city has an accident in the small town of Grady, Georgia, and is sentenced to work in the local "hospital" for a while.
Such is Doc Hollywood a sweet little comedy I saw way back when it forst came out starring Micael J Fox as the ornery Doctor who thinks he's on his way to big things and big places, until one day certain circumstances put him in a very small town where he winds up learning a lot about where his happiness truly lies.
Mr Michael J Fox is more convincing as the big city man than the country boy he eventually aspires to be but it is the extraordinary Miss Julie Warner who keeps "Doc Hollywood" from disappearing up its own Jubilation T.Cornpone.From the moment he sees her Dr Stone's career as a Plastic Surgeon is dead in the water - he just needs to be made to realise it.
Fox plays surgeon 'Ben Stone', a hopeful young doctor who is accidentally detained in a small country town while on his way to the West Coast to take up a position as a plastic surgeon.