Movie review - Doctor#2 - "Doctor at Sea" (1955) ***

Breezy, 50s British fun - in colour, full of high spirits, an accomplished cast well led by Dirk Bogarde. It cleverly rehashes events of the first film by redoing them at sea - like the university in Doctor in the House the ship here is similar to a school, with stern-and-bluff-but-ultimately-loveable teachers (James Robertson Justice playing a different character but really the same type of role, Geoffrey Keen) overseeing good natured escapades from the junior officers, including Bogarde and some other young blades (a lecherous red head, a jolly good old chap with grey hair), and some wacky antics from the lower classes. There are drunken binges which result in a night in the clink, a sports game, attractive starlets, and a medical climax where Bogarde earns the ship's respect by removing an appendix.

Bogarde spends the majority of the film avoiding women - he runs away to sea to avoid the attentions of his boss' daughter, flees from a sexy nightclub singer in a South American port, and even shies away from a very cute, pre-fame Bridget Bardot. Later on he's meant to fall in love with her and only manages a half-convincing job - neither really seem into each other in that final railing-at-sunset scene and seem to find it very easy to say goodbye. (They are thrown together at the end again but more out of luck than anything else).

Some funny scenes, like Bogarde fending off the angry father of a drunk girl by diagnosing an illness, and Justice being pursued by the ditzy daughter of the ocean liner - and a touching one where the forelock tugging lower orders give Bogarde a gift. Bardot is fetching, and even wears a swimsuit in one scene, Justice is in great form, Bogarde handsome, Kenneth More is missed. A sweet relic of a bygone era.