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The Young Doctors (1961), directed by Phil Karlson from a novel by Arthur Hailey, is one of the few films I've ever seen that highlights the work done by pathologists.

The plot lines are fairly predictable, but they hold your interest. The acting ranges from excellent (Fredric March) to adequate (Ben Gazzara) to barely adequate (Dick Clark) to inadequate (Ina Balin). (Aline MacMahon as Dr. Lucy Grainger does extremely well in a supporting role.)

The medicine that we see has held up pretty well over 43 years. However, the initial case review in which March demonstrates his "take no prisoners" approach actually was not mismanaged.

Despite the weakness of "The Young Doctors," it held our attention and brought out emotional responses.

It's not worth a special trip to find it, but if you see the film offered for rental, you could do much worse.

Watching The Young Doctors again after many years, I was struck by the film's no nonsense approach to the vagaries of medicine. While circumstances-and science have changed in the intervening 47 years since the movies' initial release, the drama of life and death in a hospital, as trite as that sounds, plays out with earnestness and poignancy. Ben Gazarra plays pathologist David Coleman, assigned to a lab headed by the incumbent Doctor Pearson.(Fredric March.) Pearson, (played to perfection by March), resents the younger man's attempts to modernize the antiquated path lab. The push-pull dynamic between the two men is believable,even if it does, at times, creep toward cheesiness. Coleman's budding relationship with nurse Cathy Hunt (Ina Balin), has to hit the right note, as their interaction figures prominently in the climax of the story. Both actors are up to the task, especially Gazarra, who makes his character live and breathe-and be real. The poignant scene of an exhausted Eddie Albert as a doctor trying to give a dying infant a chance at life resonates-even today. I found the film compelling and genuinely moving, just as I did when I saw it for the first time.

This movie was quite a pleasant surprise. I expected something along the lines of The Interns (which was a piece of trash), however for 1961, it was fairly authentic as to hospital and medical aspects. But but best of all, the relationships of the main characters carried the story, which included portrayals of women with intelligence and independence - a real exception for movies of the time. Talented performances by most of the main actors/actresses deserve mention: Fredric March (for the most part, eschewing his predilection for over-acting), Ben Gazarra, Ina Bilan (who's never gotten the credit she really deserves), Aline McMahon, and Dick Clark (I never even knew he was an actor). I could find nothing in the IMDb database about Oscars, but certainly some of these performers deserved at least to be nominated. I'm glad I caught it on TCM.

As a medical student, I found this film to be enjoyable not because it features a groundbreaking plot but based on the wonderful insight it offers into the practice of medicine in the mid 20th century.

The characters are well developed and the actors do a great job with an average story. Personally, I thought Dick Clark's character was probably the weakest and Ben Gazzara stole the show.

If you are in the field of medicine, I think you will find this an enjoyable watch. You will also be offered a reminder of how far medicine has come, even in the last 50-60 years.

Overall, I rated this title 8/10 as it offers an average, but interesting story with some great acting.

The title of this film, The Young Doctors, is quite misleading. The film focuses on a generational conflict between two doctors in a big city hospital, the older man Fredric March the head of the Pathology Department and a new man, Ben Gazzara, put in charge of the Serology section. There are other doctors in the film, but their parts are merely in support of these two.

March is an older guy who feels a not so gentle nudge from the higher ups who feel maybe it's time he put in his retirement. Like a lot of people in his age bracket, his job is his life and he can't separate where one begins and the other leaves off.

Ben Gazzara's character is borrowed heavily from Robert Mitchum's in Not As a Stranger. He's the young idealistic type with more than a touch of arrogance however. Put Gazzara and March in the same work environment and we have the recipe for a pretty good medical drama.

Medical settings have been almost as good as courtrooms for drama. That's because in both you are dealing with life and death issues. What makes The Young Doctors unique is that this is the only film in my memory that has to deal with the Pathology Lab. Usually medical dramas take place with surgeons or researchers as the protagonists. What I like about The Young Doctors is that it shows another part of the hospital does play a critical role. My mother was in fact a secretary in a Pathology Lab in a hospital and if she were alive now, she'd be the first to applaud this film.

Both March and Gazzara turn out to be very human after all and both make a major blunder each on a given case. Yet they develop a healthy respect for each other as time goes by.

Other performances you will like here is Ina Balin as a student nurse with a major medical condition, Edward Andrews as another pathologist, Dick Clark who's another young doctor whose wife, Phyllis Love, is having a difficult pregnancy, and Aline McMahon, friend and confidante of March. I have a feeling that Florence Eldridge may have been offered the part before McMahon.

One guy here who is outstanding is the ever dependable Eddie Albert who plays a pediatrician. The most harrowing scene in the film is during an operation on Clark's newborn infant to give him a blood transfusion. Watch Albert's performance with minimal dialog during the procedure. As the sweat pours down him you feel right with him the worry and concern he has for his littlest patient barely able to taste life. His skill allows the newborn to have that crack at making his mark in the world.

We've seen medical dramas from Arrowsmith to ER and The Young Doctors takes an honored place among them.