Movies:
The Hospital
DVD Release
- Release Date: 2003
- English: mono
- Spanish: mono
- cc
- Original theatrical trailer
- English, French & Spanish subtitles
- Rating:
- Genre: Comedy
- Movie Type: Black Comedy, Satire
- Themes: Fighting the System, Doctors and Patients, Midlife Crises
- Director: Arthur Hiller
- Main Cast: Rehn Scofield, George C. Scott, Diana Rigg, Barnard Hughes, Nancy Marchand, Stephen Elliott
- Release Year: 1971
- Country: US
- Run Time: 103 minutes
- MPAA Rating: PG
Plot
Directed by Arthur Hiller from the second of three Academy Award-winning screenplays by Paddy Chayefsky, The Hospital is a black comedy centering on Dr. Herbert Bock (George C. Scott), a bitter, suicidal surgeon. While patients at the hospital die left and right due to the extreme carelessness and ineptness of the staff that surrounds him, the lonely Bock finds himself falling for Barbara (Diana Rigg), the daughter of Edmund (Barnard Hughes), a patient. Meanwhile, a mysterious killer has begun stalking the hospital, taking out the patients who don't die from poor treatment first. In addition to Chayefsky's Oscar win, The Hospital garnered a Best Actor nomination for Scott, who lost to Gene Hackman for The French Connection. ~ Matthew Tobey, All Movie GuideReview
A piece of early '70s social commentary and a de facto warm-up for Network (1976), writer Paddy Chayefsky takes on the medical system in The Hospital (1971). Devised as a satire that could later pass for social realism in an HMO-ruled culture, the matter-of-fact pre-credits voice-over accounting how medical malfeasance resulted in an empty bed for a sexual tryst caustically sets the tone for what follows. Bureaucracy, publicity-hungry "radical" protesters, murders, overcrowding, and sloppy medicine are but a few of the problems that push George C. Scott's honorable Dr. Bock to the suicidal edge. Hippie Diana Rigg's invitation to flee south of the border actually makes sense. Bock's death wish illuminates the genuine pathos and hopelessness caused by the systemic breakdown, but the near-slapstick climax and final cynical summation by Bock's colleague inject bitter levity into the drama. Coming off his blockbuster success with Love Story (1970), director Arthur Hiller earned artistic kudos and a prize at the Berlin Film Festival for The Hospital. Dr. Bock's despair, passion, and resignation earned recalcitrant Oscar-winner Scott another nomination for Best Actor. Chayefsky himself won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay, an award he would win again for Network's satirical attack of TV culture. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie GuideCast
- George C. Scott - Dr. Herbert Bock
- Diana Rigg - Barbara Drummond
- Barnard Hughes - Mr. Drummond
- Nancy Marchand - Head Nurse
- Stephen Elliott - Hospital Executive
- Rehn Scofield - Dr. Spezio
Donald Harron - Hospital Executive; Lenny Baker - Dr. Schaefer; Roberts Blossom - Hospital Victim; Jacqueline Brookes - Dr. Immelman; Stockard Channing; Jordan Charney - Hitchcock; Alex Colon - Young Lord; Lorrie Davis - Nurse Divine; Andrew Duncan - William Mead; Richard Dysart - Dr. Welbeck; Julie Garfield - Nurse Perez; Richard Hamilton - Dr. Ronald Casey; Kate Harrington - Nurse Dunne; Katherine Helmond - Marilyn Mead; Bette Henritze - Operating Room Nurse; Teresa Hughes - Mrs. Donovan; Nancy MacKay - Sheilah; Paul Mace - Intern Ambler; Angie Ortega - Drummond's Victim; Lou Polan - Dr. Lagerman; Tom Spratley - Mitgang; Frances Sternhagen - Mrs. Cushing; Robert Walden - Young Doctor; Christopher Guest - Resident; David Hooks - Psychiatrist; Robert Anthony - Dr. Ives; Cynthia Belgrave - Nurse Reardon
