Editing Doctor Dolittle (1967 film) (section)

==Reception==
===Critical reaction===
Reviewing the film for ''[[The New York Times]]'', [[Bosley Crowther]] said: "The music is not exceptional, the rendering of the songs lacks variety, and the pace, under Richard Fleischer's direction, is slow and without surprise."<ref>{{Cite news |last=Crowther |first=Bosley |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1967/12/20/archives/screen-that-grand-zoomanitarian-doctor-dolittle-arrives-for-the.html |title=Screen: That Grand Zoomanitarian, 'Doctor Dolittle', Arrives for the Holidays on a Great Pink Snail |date=December 20, 1967 |work=The New York Times |access-date=March 31, 2013 |page=55 |archive-date=May 8, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190508153406/https://www.nytimes.com/1967/12/20/archives/screen-that-grand-zoomanitarian-doctor-dolittle-arrives-for-the.html |url-status=live}}</ref> [[Charles Champlin]] of the ''[[Los Angeles Times]]'' claimed that "''Doctor Dolittle'', though it is beautiful, often funny, often charming, tuneful and gay, is in an odd way never really sentimentally moving, even in the sense that it sets up in us elders a yearning for lost youth. It is a picture we can greatly enjoy seeing our children enjoy, but without feeling quite at one with them."<ref>{{Cite news |last=Champlin |first=Charles |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/18732052/the_los_angeles_times/ |title='Dr. Dolittle' a Musical Menagerie |date=December 24, 1967 |work=Los Angeles Times |access-date=January 21, 2020 |via=Newspapers.com |page=12 |archive-date=June 3, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210603102105/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/18732052/the-los-angeles-times/ |url-status=live}} {{Open access}}</ref> ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' magazine wrote: "Somehow—with the frequent but by no means infallible exception of Walt Disney—Hollywood has never learned what so many children's book writers have known all along: size and a big budget are no substitutes for originality and charm."<ref>{{Cite magazine |date=December 29, 1967 |title=New Movies: Dr. Dolittle |url=https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,844344,00.html |magazine=Time |page=54 |access-date=January 21, 2020 |archive-date=July 18, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210718011729/http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,844344,00.html |url-status=live}}</ref> Robert B. Frederick of ''[[Variety (magazine)|Variety]]'' acknowledged the film as an "imperfect gem", but felt "there's sufficient values going for it to survive any barbs aimed at it by the critics".<ref>{{cite news |last=Frederick |first=Robert B. |url=https://archive.org/details/sim_variety_1967-12-20_249_5/page/n5/mode/1up |title=Film Reviews: Doctor Dolittle |work=Variety |page=6 |date=December 20, 1967 |via=Internet Archive}}</ref>

Retrospectively, in his annual ''[[Leonard Maltin's Movie Guide|Movie Guide]]'', critic and film historian [[Leonard Maltin]] admired the film's photography, but called it a "colossal musical dud that almost ruined 20th Century-Fox studios." He concluded by admitting that "The movie has one merit: if you have unruly children, it may put them to sleep."<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://archive.org/details/leonardmaltins2000leon/page/362 |title=Leonard Maltin's 2008 Movie Guide |publisher=Signet |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-451-22186-5 |editor-last=Maltin |editor-first=Leonard |editor-link=Leonard Maltin |location=New York |page=[https://archive.org/details/leonardmaltins2000leon/page/362 362] |url-access=registration}}</ref> On the [[review aggregation]] website [[Rotten Tomatoes]], the film has an approval rating of 29% based on 21 reviews, with an average score of 4.3/10.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/doctor_dolittle |title=Doctor Dolittle (1967) |work=[[Rotten Tomatoes]] |publisher=[[Fandango Media|Fandango]] |access-date=September 18, 2021 |archive-date=May 23, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190523153228/https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/doctor_dolittle/ |url-status=live}}</ref> On [[Metacritic]], it has a [[weighted average]] score of 34 out of 100 based on 6 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable" reviews.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.metacritic.com/movie/doctor-dolittle-1967 |title=Doctor Dolittle Reviews |work=[[Metacritic]] |publisher=[[CBS Interactive]] |access-date=July 30, 2019 |archive-date=June 3, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210603102105/https://www.metacritic.com/movie/doctor-dolittle-1967 |url-status=live}}</ref>

===Box office===
The film faced strong competition at the box office from [[Walt Disney Animation Studios|Disney]]'s animated feature film ''[[The Jungle Book (1967 film)|The Jungle Book]]'', which had opened to considerable critical and audience acclaim two months earlier and was still in wide release. ''Doctor Dolittle''{{'}}s appeal as family fare was undermined when the press drew attention to allegedly racist content in Lofting's books, prompting demands to have them removed from school libraries.{{sfn|Harris|2008|p=378}}

According to studio records, the film needed to earn $31,275,000 in rentals to break even, and by December 1970 it had only made $16.3&nbsp;million.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Silverman |first=Stephen M |url=https://archive.org/details/foxthatgotawayt00silv |title=The Fox That Got Away: The Last Days of the Zanuck dynasty at Twentieth Century-Fox |publisher=L. Stuart |year=1988 |page=[https://archive.org/details/foxthatgotawayt00silv/page/326 326] |isbn=9780818404856 |url-access=registration}}</ref> In September 1970, Fox estimated it had lost $11,141,000 on the film.{{sfn|Silverman|1988|p=259}}