As David Thomson argues in his unimpeachable Biographical Dictionary of Film, this film is not about Arthur Hiller; his contribution is barely noticeable. It is about screenwriter Paddy Chayefsky and a towering central performance by George C. Scott as Dr Bock, a haunting performance of a conflicted man: a conscientious Doctor embodying the decaying ideals of public service and enlightenment as chaos reigns in his hospital.
The film stands on the cusp of the changing times, as the new 'realism' of the 1970s began to be felt: in the cold, harsh light of a new decade, the assumptions of consumer-driven economic growth and a benevolent welfare state came under threat. As prosperity began to dwindle, the divisions of the 1960s between new and old ideas - political and personal - came to the fore in a much less comfortable new context.
Chayefsky is even-handed with the new counter-culture; young people - perhaps rightly - protesting at the state of the hospital, but unlikely to be able to assume the sort of responsibility exercised by Dr Bock. Bock is dismayed that so much of the 'revolution' is merely personal - it is not about serious issues like race or even Vietnam, for many of the young, but a sexual revolution: inward looking ("Kids are more hung up on sex than the Victorians"). But then there is the eccentric 'acidhead' Barbara Drummond, played with matter-of-fact charm by Diana Rigg, who just might prove Bock's salvation, in several ways; someone at last with whom he can at last who can have a soul bearing conversation.
The film loses some focus, I feel, in the morning after Bock's liaison with Barbara; the killer-at-large business, whilst amusing in a wacky, playing-with-melodrama sense, does not really work as well as the earlier institutional satire and thoughtful characterisation. The character Dr Welbeck (Richard Dysart) comes across as too obvious a bogeyman, although his inclusion is justified by the brilliantly concise verbal assassination he receives from the world-weary Bock (87mins in).
The film is best when it explores the lack of responsibility, the passing of the buck; an ailing bureaucracy that kills its patients, with staff agents of what is effectively an institutional virus. This film conveys better than most the melancholy of good intentions being undermined, of obstacles to good work; of the noble vocation of public service in jeopardy. Fans of the justifiably acclaimed media satire "Network" (1976) will appreciate an equally scabrous, truth-telling script by Chayefsky - surely one of the finest, though sadly least prolific, Hollywood scriptwriters. And, the great George C. Scott, superb in "Dr Strangelove" and "Anatomy of a Murder", is even better in this neglected, minor classic of a film.
The film stands on the cusp of the changing times, as the new 'realism' of the 1970s began to be felt: in the cold, harsh light of a new decade, the assumptions of consumer-driven economic growth and a benevolent welfare state came under threat. As prosperity began to dwindle, the divisions of the 1960s between new and old ideas - political and personal - came to the fore in a much less comfortable new context.
Chayefsky is even-handed with the new counter-culture; young people - perhaps rightly - protesting at the state of the hospital, but unlikely to be able to assume the sort of responsibility exercised by Dr Bock. Bock is dismayed that so much of the 'revolution' is merely personal - it is not about serious issues like race or even Vietnam, for many of the young, but a sexual revolution: inward looking ("Kids are more hung up on sex than the Victorians"). But then there is the eccentric 'acidhead' Barbara Drummond, played with matter-of-fact charm by Diana Rigg, who just might prove Bock's salvation, in several ways; someone at last with whom he can at last who can have a soul bearing conversation.
The film loses some focus, I feel, in the morning after Bock's liaison with Barbara; the killer-at-large business, whilst amusing in a wacky, playing-with-melodrama sense, does not really work as well as the earlier institutional satire and thoughtful characterisation. The character Dr Welbeck (Richard Dysart) comes across as too obvious a bogeyman, although his inclusion is justified by the brilliantly concise verbal assassination he receives from the world-weary Bock (87mins in).
The film is best when it explores the lack of responsibility, the passing of the buck; an ailing bureaucracy that kills its patients, with staff agents of what is effectively an institutional virus. This film conveys better than most the melancholy of good intentions being undermined, of obstacles to good work; of the noble vocation of public service in jeopardy. Fans of the justifiably acclaimed media satire "Network" (1976) will appreciate an equally scabrous, truth-telling script by Chayefsky - surely one of the finest, though sadly least prolific, Hollywood scriptwriters. And, the great George C. Scott, superb in "Dr Strangelove" and "Anatomy of a Murder", is even better in this neglected, minor classic of a film.