| The Elephant Man | |
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| Directed by | David Lynch |
| Screenplay by |
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| Produced by | Jonathan Sanger |
| Starring | |
| Cinematography | Freddie Francis |
| Edited by | Anne V. Coates |
| Music by | John Morris |
Production company | |
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Release dates |
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Running time | 123 minutes[2] |
| Countries |
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| Language | English |
| Budget | $5 million |
| Box office | $26 million(North America)[4] |
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The Elephant Man is a 1980biographicalhistorical drama film loosely based on the life ofJoseph Merrick (named "John" in the film), a severely deformed man who lived inLondon in the late 19th century. The film was directed byDavid Lynch, produced byJonathan Sanger, and executive produced byMel Brooks (who was uncredited, to avoid audiences anticipating the film being in the vein of his comedic works, although his company Brooksfilms is in the opening credits). It starsJohn Hurt,Anthony Hopkins,Anne Bancroft,John Gielgud,Wendy Hiller,Michael Elphick,Hannah Gordon, andFreddie Jones.
The screenplay was adapted by Lynch, Christopher De Vore, andEric Bergren fromFrederick Treves'The Elephant Man and Other Reminiscences (1923) andAshley Montagu'sThe Elephant Man: A Study in Human Dignity (1971). It was shot inblack-and-white byFreddie Francis and featured make-up work byChristopher Tucker.
The Elephant Man was a critical and commercial success, with critics highlighting Lynch's direction and Hurt's performance. The filmgarnered several accolades including threeBAFTA Awards (includingBest Film), and nominations for eightAcademy Awards and fourGolden Globe Awards. After receiving widespread criticism for failing to honor the make-up effects, theAcademy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was prompted to create acompetitive award for Best Makeup the following year.
Frederick Treves, asurgeon at theLondon Hospital, finds the disfigured and seemingly-mute John Merrick in aVictorianfreak show. Mr. Bytes, the brutish ringmaster, tells lurid stories of howelephants sexually assaulted Merrick's mother to create a half-human monster. Hoping to gain notoriety with a medical discovery, Treves pays Bytes to bring Merrick to the hospital for examination, wearing a hood for discretion.
Treves presents Merrick to his colleagues and highlights Merrick's physical abnormalities. In particular, Merrick's deformed skull forces him to sleep sitting up, as lying down wouldasphyxiate him. Bytes savagely beats him after the lecture, and Merrick is sent back to the hospital. The matron, Mrs Mothershead, reluctantly tends to him, as the other nurses are too frightened of him.
Treves diagnoses Merrick with anintellectual disability. His boss, Mr. Carr Gomm, points out that if he is right, Merrick cannot stay, as the hospital does not accept "incurables". It turns out that Merrick is actually intelligent and can speak, albeit with severe difficulty. To prove that Merrick can make progress, Treves trains him to say basic conversational sentences and part of the23rd Psalm to Carr Gomm. Merrick is so nervous that he cannot respond to questions coherently, prompting Carr Gomm to excuse himself. As he is leaving, Merrick proves his intelligence and his ability to read by reciting the entire 23rd Psalm from memory. Although Merrick's physical condition is incurable and he has no mental condition to cure, Carr Gomm allows him to stay.
Treves slowly broadens Merrick's world. He gives Merrick supplies to build a model of the nearbySt Philip's Church. He invites Merrick to tea with his wife Ann, where they exchange photos of their families. Merrick tells Ann that he must have been a disappointment to his mother, but hopes she would be proud to see him with friends, which brings Ann to tears. Overwhelmed by the shock of being treated with kindness, Merrick also cries.
Fashionable society takes an interest in Merrick. ActressMadge Kendal gives him a copy ofRomeo and Juliet; Merrick is fascinated by the theatre, but has never seen a play. The two perform a romantic dialogue from the play, which culminates in a kiss. In addition,Queen Victoria and PrincessAlexandra arrange for him to be permanently admitted to the hospital. However, other society guests treat Merrick with visible disgust. Mothershead, who has grown to respect Merrick, realizes that Victorian society makes a show of helping Merrick to reassure itself of its own Christian values; the film periodically highlights society's indifference to the poor. She compares Treves to Bytes' freak show, which shakes him greatly.
A new freak show begins when Jim, an unscrupulous hospital employee, begins selling tickets to gawk at, and sometimes physically torment, Merrick. Bytes buys a ticket, kidnaps Merrick, and spirits him to a freak show on Belgium. The next morning, Treves accuses Jim for lying and getting involved with Bytes to kidnap Merrick, and Mrs. Mothershead hits Jim with a package and fires him in the process.
Merrick's health rapidly deteriorates during the show, and he collapses in front of the audiences; an audience member spat at Bytes in disgust. To punish him, Bytes drunkenly cages him in captivity with monkeys. The boy and other freak show attractions break him out and send him to England. InLiverpool Street station, three boys harass him. Merrick flees and accidentally knocks down a girl, prompting an angry mob to chase him. Defenceless, he cries out, "I am not an elephant! I am not an animal! I am a human being! I am a man!" and faints.[5] The police bring Merrick back to the hospital.
Treves and other people in the hospital realize that Merrick is dying, and tries to make his final days comfortable. He apologizes to Merrick for his ordeal, but Merrick says he is happy and fulfilled due to Treves' efforts. Treves responds that Merrick has helped him too. Princess Alexandra invites Merrick to the royal box for apantomime, his first-ever show. Kendal dedicates the performance to him. Treves prompts Merrick to show his face to the crowd, which gives him a standing ovation.
Back at the hospital, Merrick and Treves bid each other goodnight, and Merrick completes his church model. He lies down to sleep, as he has always dreamed of doing. As he dies, he sees a vision of his mother, who quotesLord Tennyson's "Nothing Will Die".
ProducerJonathan Sanger optioned the script from writers Christopher De Vore andEric Bergren after receiving the script from his babysitter.[7] Sanger had been working asMel Brooks' assistant director onHigh Anxiety.[8] Sanger showed Brooks the script, whereupon he decided to help finance via Brooksfilms, his new company. Brooks' personal assistant, Stuart Cornfeld, suggestedDavid Lynch to Sanger.[9][8]
Sanger met Lynch, and they shared scripts they were working on (The Elephant Man and Lynch's unrealizedRonnie Rocket). Lynch told Sanger that he would love to direct the script after reading it, and Sanger endorsed him after hearing Lynch's ideas. However, Brooks had not heard of Lynch at the time. Sanger and Cornfeld set up anEraserhead viewing at a20th Century Fox screening room; Brooks loved it and enthusiastically agreed for Lynch to direct.[8] By his own request, Brooks was not credited as executive producer to ensure that audiences would not expect a comedy after seeing his name attached.[10]
Dustin Hoffman wanted the role of John Merrick, but Sanger rejected the idea, saying "We’re always going to be looking to see where the Elephant Man ends and Dustin Hoffman begins". Lynch considered his friendJack Nance, who he worked with onEraserhead, for the role, but he cast John Hurt in the role after seeingThe Naked Civil Servant.[11] At the time, Hurt was still makingHeaven's Gate which had fallen badly behind schedule due to directorMichael Cimino's perfectionism. Hurt spent so long waiting for something to do that he performed the role of Merrick in the interim before returning toHeaven's Gate to complete shooting.[12]
The budget was $5 million, $4 million of which was raised fromFred Silverman ofNBC.[7] The remainder came fromEMI Films.[13][14]
For his second feature and first studio film, albeit one independently financed,[15] Lynch provided the musical direction and sound design. Lynch also tried to design the make-up himself, but the design didn't work.[7][16] The makeup, now supervised byChristopher Tucker, was based on direct casts of Merrick's body, which had been kept in theRoyal London Hospital's private museum. The makeup took seven to eight hours to apply each day and two hours to delicately remove.[7]John Hurt would arrive on set at 5 am and shoot his scenes from noon until 10 pm. After his first experience of the inconvenience of having to apply the makeup and perform with it, he called his girlfriend, saying, "I think they have finally managed to make me hate acting."[17] Because of the strain on the actor, he worked alternate days.[7]
The film is bookended withsurrealist sequences centred around Merrick's mother and her death. Lynch usedSamuel Barber'sAdagio for Strings to underline the climax and Merrick's own death. ComposerJohn Morris argued against using the music, stating that "this piece is going to be used over and over and over again in the future... And every time it's used in a film it's going to diminish the effect of the scene."[18]
Following their return from England with a print, Lynch and Sanger screenedThe Elephant Man for Brooks, who suggested some minor cuts but told them that the film would be released as they had made it.[9]
AWest Endplay of the same name was enjoying a successful Broadway run at the time of the film's production. The producers sued Brooksfilms over the use of the title.[19][7]
The Elephant Man was a box office hit, grossing $26 million in the United States.[4][7] In Japan, it was the second highest-grossing foreign film of the year withtheatrical rentals of ¥2.45 billion, behind onlyThe Empire Strikes Back.[20]
Onreview aggregatorRotten Tomatoes, it has an approval rating of 91% based on 64 reviews, with an average score of 8.5/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "David Lynch's relatively straight second feature finds an admirable synthesis of compassion and restraint in treating its subject, and features outstanding performances by John Hurt and Anthony Hopkins."[21] OnMetacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 78 out of 100 based on 16 critic reviews, indicating "generally favourable reviews".[22]
Vincent Canby wrote: "Mr. Hurt is truly remarkable. It can't be easy to act under such a heavy mask ... the physical production is beautiful, especially Freddie Francis' black-and-white photography."[23]
A small number of critics were less favourable.Roger Ebert gave it 2/4 stars, writing: "I kept asking myself what the film was really trying to say about thehuman condition as reflected by John Merrick, and I kept drawing blanks."[24] In the bookThe Spectacle of Deformity: Freak Shows and Modern British Culture,Nadja Durbach describes the work as "much more mawkish and moralising than one would expect from the leading postmodern surrealist filmmaker" and "unashamedly sentimental". She blamed this mawkishness on the use of Treves' memoirs as source material.[25]
The Elephant Man has since been ranked among the best films of the 1980s inTime Out (where it placed 19th),[26]Paste (56th),[27] andRolling Stone (38th),[28] and among the greatest biopics of all time.[29][30][28][31] The film also received five votes in the 2012Sight & Sound polls.[32] The February 2020 issue ofNew York Magazine listsThe Elephant Man as among "The Best Movies That Lost Best Picture at the Oscars."[33]
The Elephant Man was nominated for eightAcademy Awards,[34] tyingRaging Bull at the53rd Academy Awards, includingBest Picture,Actor in a Leading Role (Hurt),[35]Art Direction-Set Decoration (Stuart Craig,Robert Cartwright,Hugh Scaife),Best Costume Design,Best Director,Best Film Editing,Music: Original Score, andWriting: Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium.[36] However, it did not win any.
Industry experts were appalled that the film was not going to be honoured for its make-up effects when theAcademy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced its nominations at the time. A letter of protest was sent to the academy's Board of Governors requesting to give the film an honorary award. The academy refused, but in response to the outcry, they decided to give the make-up artists their own category. A year later, theAcademy Award for Best Makeup category was introduced withAn American Werewolf in London as its first recipient.[7][37]
It won theBAFTA Award for Best Film, and otherBAFTA Awards for Best Actor (Hurt) and Best Production Design, and was nominated for four others: Direction, Screenplay, Cinematography and Editing.
The film is recognized byAmerican Film Institute in these lists:
The film has been issued many times onVHS,Betamax,CED,LaserDisc andDVD. The first DVD was released on December 11, 2001, by Paramount Home Entertainment.[39] The version released as part of the David LynchLime Green Box includes several interviews with Lynch and Hurt, and a Joseph Merrick documentary.[40] This material is also available on the exclusive treatment on theEuropean market as part ofOptimum Releasing's StudioCanal Collection.[41][42] The film has been available onBlu-ray since 2009 throughout Europe and in Australia and Japan but not in the US (however the discs will play in both region A & B players).[43]
A 4K restoration (created from theoriginal camera negative, supervised by Lynch) was carried out for the film's 40th anniversary, and was released in a director-approved special edition in both Blu-ray and DVD formats fromThe Criterion Collection in the United States on September 29, 2020.[44] The restoration was also released on4K Ultra HD Blu-ray (including a remastered Blu-ray) in the UK in April 2020.[45]
A tie-in novelization byChristine Sparks was published byBallantine Books in 1980.[46]
The musical score ofThe Elephant Man was composed and conducted byJohn Morris, and it was performed by theNational Philharmonic Orchestra. In 1980, the company20th Century Fox Records published this film's original musical score as both anLP album and as acassette in the United States. Its front cover artwork features a masked John Merrick against a backdrop of smoke, as seen on the advance theatrical poster for the film.
In 1994, the firstcompact disc (CD) issue of the film score was made by the companyMilan, which specializes infilm scores andsoundtrack albums.[47]
Track listing for the first U.S. release on LP
Side one
Side two
Michael Jackson used excerpts from the film in his song "Morphine" from the 1997 remix albumBlood on the Dance Floor: HIStory in the Mix.[48]
The Jam's former bassistBruce Foxton was inspired strongly by the film, and in response wrote the song "Freak" with the single's cover making a reference to the film.[49]
ActorBradley Cooper credits watching the film with his father as a child as his inspiration to become an actor. Cooper played the character in a Broadway revival ofThe Elephant Man play in 2014.[50]
Inseason 3, episode 21 ofThe Simpsons, "Black Widower",Lisa daydreams ofAunt Selma's new boyfriend as the Elephant Man.[51]
In season 4, episode 13 ofSeinfeld, "The Pick", in defense of allegedly picking his nose, Jerry pleads to a surrounding crowd: "Are we not human? If we pick, do we not bleed? I am not an animal!"[52]
The 1992 filmBatman Returns parodies the iconic line "I am not an animal. I am a man." In one scene,the Penguin, after being called Oswald, angrily yells "I am not a human being! I am an animal!"[53]
British TV presenterKarl Pilkington has often cited the film as his favorite, and has referenced it frequently during his appearances onThe Ricky Gervais Show.[54]
MusicianMichael Stipe loves the film and cites it as an inspiration for theR.E.M. song "Carnival of Sorts (Boxcars)".[55] Another R.E.M. song, "New Test Leper", quotes the line "I am not an animal."[56]
MusicianNicole Dollanganger featured a sample of the film in her 2012 song "Cries of the Elephant Man Bones".[57]
MusicianMylène Farmer's song "Psychiatric" from the 1991 albumL'autre... is a tribute to the film andJohn Hurt's voice is sampled throughout the song, repeating several times: "I'm a human being, I'm not an animal".[58]
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