As an adult, Dr. John Dolittle represents the pinnacle of professional conformity. He is a successful surgeon poised to sell his practice to a massive healthcare conglomerate. The film uses Murphy’s fast-talking, high-capitalism persona to illustrate the distance Dolittle has traveled from his authentic self. His medical practice is depicted as sterile and transactional; he barely listens to his human patients, preferring to get them in and out of the office to maximize profit. The return of his ability to communicate with animals serves as a disruption to this capitalist conformity, forcing him to acknowledge the repressed imagination of his childhood.
You dislike crude humor, can’t forgive dated CGI, or expect a faithful adaptation of the classic literary character. dr dolittle 1