This review is more than likely
going to veer a lot into the realm of comic book nerdery, so you have my
apologies at the outset.
The honorific “Doctor” makes just
about any word coming after it sound more important or alternately
menacing. Would Doctor Who be as cool if
he were just Who? Would Dr. Diane
Shmelman be held in as high regard if she were just Miss Shmelman? Would Doctor Death be less of a threat if he
were just Death? Well, yeah, maybe on
that one. Anyone’s name is augmented
with honorifics; that’s kind of the point.
In an odd sort of way they bestow a mantle of adulthood on the bearer by
the speaker, or at least they do when used in a forthright manner (though
admittedly, this only really effective on kids and young adults). But perhaps what they do best (at least in
terms of showmanship) is confer the tone by which the holder’s character is
meant to be gauged. Witness: Mr.
Majestyk, Ms. 45, Professor X, Captain Kangaroo, etcetera, etcetera. Almost every honorific in recorded history
has its share of badasses and morts attached to it, but to my mind, none are
quite as potent as “Doctor.” Funny thing
is, unlike so many fictive characters who share the title, Dr. Strange actually is a medical practitioner.
The Ancient One (a stop motion
creation voiced by the late, great Michael
Ansara, and more than likely
intended to be the dread Dormammu) informs elderly (yet still smoking hot)
underling Morgan LeFay (Jessica Walters)
that she has only three days to pierce the barrier between the dark realm and
our dimension and vanquish the elderly and current Sorcerer Supreme, Thomas
Lindmer (John Mills). Employing the unwitting assistance of lovely,
soon-to-be Buck Rogers Babe, Clea (Anne-Marie
Martin aka Eddie Benton), Morgan
very leisurely sets about her task. Enter
Dr. Stephen Strange (Peter Hooten), a
warm-hearted physician and a cold-blooded lover, who just so happens to be
connected to all of this much more personally than he would expect (but hardly
the audience).
Outside of cartoons, I believe
Marvel Comics characters came to the live-action world of television adventures
a bit later than their main rival DC Comics.
There was the Shazam
television series starting in 1974, the Cathy
Lee Crosby version of Wonder Woman
who appeared in a TV movie that same year.
Prior to this there were, of course, series starring both Batman and Superman. However, to the
best of my knowledge, the first Marvel character to hit the live-action world
was their own wall-crawling web slinger in 1977’s Amazing Spider-Man program (episodes of which were condensed and
edited together into feature length form a few years down the road). Funny enough, the character with the best
track record on television (two original pilot films, a show running five
seasons, plus several more television features afterward), The Incredible Hulk, is also the one with the least cinematic
success (hopefully this will change in the near future, as he’s my personal
favorite). Following this Dr. Strange outing, Captain America would even get a couple of films in which action
star Reb Brown was allowed to strut
his proverbial stuff.
But this time period was really a
heyday (at least in my mind) for the popularity of comic book superheroes (a
time which is seemingly repeating itself currently, though now it could be
argued they are much more self-serious).
They had seeped into the popular culture and saturated the market with
everything from stickers to posters to records to toys to costumes and on and
on and on. But if you look at the
above-mentioned characters, they predominantly all had a presence in the pop
culture psyche before they hit the screen (big or small). Hell, most of DC’s characters referred to here
were created before or around the onset of World War Two (and yes, I know
Shazam aka Captain Marvel was not even created at DC, but that’s another
discussion). Hulk and Spidey were
extremely popular in their respective comic titles, and both had also had
animated runs to further cement their statures.
By this logic, Dr. Strange
seems a…um…strange choice to elect for Hollywood treatment, but if you look at
the culture of the time, it actually comes a bit sharper into focus. There was a fascination with all things occult
and supernatural at this time. In all
sorts of media, if there weren’t ghosts haunting your house, Bigfoot raiding
your fridge, or devil worshippers living next door to you, there was something
wrong with you. Obviously, Dr. Strange, at least from a perfunctory
perspective should have fit right in and even dominated this time, but he
didn’t.
This film is part of the reason
why he didn’t (or at least explains it a bit).
Hampered as I’m sure they were by a tiny budget and a short schedule,
what writer director Philip DeGuere
turned out is perfectly passable for a Wednesday night television
programmer. And that’s the real problem. The story has any number of interesting
avenues it can explore, but it does nothing with any of them. The story of passing the mantle to the new
Sorcerer Supreme is handled offhandedly.
Morgan’s ability to manipulate people and its ties to sexual gratification
is teased but never explored (and yes, it could have been done so in a way that
would have passed the censors). The
action scenes have absolutely zero tension in them, and every obstacle is
conquered with the facility of walking up a ramp rather than with the
senses-shattering effort of climbing a giant mountain.
But even discounting these
things, and bearing in mind that origin stories are a chore to do in any sort
of fresh way even in 1978, the filmmakers (as the powers behind just about
every live-action superhero venture of the time) seem to completely miss the
point of what makes this character and characters like him compelling. It’s not that Spider-Man can climb walls and
shoot webs. It’s that he is forever
trying to work off the unbearable guilt he feels over the death of his Uncle
Ben (“With great power comes great responsibility”). It’s not that the Hulk can throw men hundreds
of feet or crack the ground with one stomp of his foot. It’s that he is the embodiment of a
suppressed rage and impotence and the inability of Dr. Banner to deal with
these issues in a healthy manner. Dr.
Strange was an ego-maniacal neurosurgeon who was maimed in a car accident and
came to know humility and enlightenment as well as discovering a new purpose in
life through the mystic arts. The
interesting parts of these characters are not their super powers but their feet
of clay. It’s sharing in their human
struggles, of identifying with their tribulations that makes them special. The costumes, the powers, the property damage
is spectacle, and though it has its place, it’s simply not enough to compel the
long term devotion these characters have garnered. By making Strange a really nice guy with an
overactive libido, he is (mostly) normalized.
His ego is no longer a problem. He
doesn’t have to suffer the loss of his hands and his medical career. All he has to do is smirk, spout a few
“magic” words, and he’s suddenly Gandalf.
I can only assume that this sort of thing is done to appeal to as many
children and age brackets as humanly possible, but the trick is it doesn’t
work. Banality does not engender
commitment to a character. I could go
on, but I already have so I’ll stop there.
As a time-waster, as filler, this movie is
acceptable. As anything that
distinguishes itself from the pack or is in any way memorable other than giving
us a couple of nice shots of Ms. Walter’s
bare legs, not so much. And yet, I’m
glad that this was made, just because it gave a very brief spotlight to one of
the more obscure superheroes from Marvel’s stable.
MVT: I love the core ideas
behind Dr. Strange as well as the
stop motion monster effects. The
execution is lacking, but what’s beneath is rich for exploration.
Make Or Break: Following
from that, I liked the scenes featuring the Ancient One and LeFay. They’re a triple threat. They have a stop motion monster. They have a beautiful woman in tight clothes. They have Ansara’s grandiose voice acting.
If only the rest lived up to this.
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