Movie lovers and film buffs will be very familiar with this film, loosely based on the real life of a seriously disfigured and deformed man in the 19th century Joseph Merrick, named John Merrick in the movie. John Hurt plays Merrick in a mesmerizing performance that despite 8 academy award nominations failed to land a single one to mass outcry and protest from movie goers. The make up design so ground breaking the category for best make up at the Oscar’s was included the following year.
If you haven’t seen the film, make sure you have a box of tissues handy, it is heart breaking at times, tackling the themes of brutal social injustice and cruelty in Victorian England. It’s alleged producer Mel Brooks better known for comedy than high drama fought to get the film shot and released in black and white which really adds to the macabre gothic nature of the piece and in my view makes the film.
It’s an absolute classic for sure with an all star cast that includes names like Sir John Gielgud, Wendy Hiller, Hannah Gordon, Patricia Hodge, Michael Elphick, Pauline Quirk,in supporting roles along side Hurt, Anthony Hopkins and Anne Bancroft as theatre star Mrs Kendal in the leading roles.
Frederick Treves is a physician who on discovering the plight of Mr. Merrick being held against his will as a believe it or not curiosity and exploited for money for viewings, rescues John Merrick dubbed “The Elephant Man” due to his severe deformities and takes him to reside at the London Hospital.
However as an incurable this benevolence goes against the policies of the Victorian hospital and Mr. Treves endures violent opposition to the Elephant Man staying in residence.
The doctor also faces his own questions surrounding the fame and accolades he is receiving from fellow medical practitioners and the newspapers about his unusual patient, who becomes the talk of London, attracting the attention of the theatre star of the day Mrs Kendal, played by Anne Bancroft.
But it is the contrasting violence and cruelty that hits hardest, as night watchman Jim Michael Elphick makes a market by night down the local boozer for working men and their whores to visit, view and humiliate Mr. Merrick by night for a price.
Some of these scene are the most brutal and upsetting in the whole piece and are not for the faint hearted challenging the hard times of the Victorian age and the lengths the poor would go to to make a fast buck.
After one such humiliation, Jim actually shares his takings with the battered, beleaguered and bewildered Mr. Merrick saying he had a particularly good night.
The film reaches a gripping conclusion when John Merrick is recaptured by his original circus ring master Mr Bytes, a cruel and heartless man played to perfection by the late Freddie Jones well known for his later role on British soap opera Sandy Thomas in Emmerdale.
This absolute gem of a British classic movie will move you tears but not before filling you with empathy and then forcing you to question your own prejudice and disassociation from the weakest and most vulnerable in society. Like a man so disfigured women scream at the very sight of him and how that exclusion, no life, no friends, no partner, no family, completely alone could ever been endured.
Shot with absolute precision, the film transports the audience to the streets of 19th century London, the cold, the damp, the harsh conditions permeate every frame from the dickenesque costumes to the street prostitutes and the machines and medical paraphernalia of the time.
It’s an exploration of great depth and meaning at a time in history when poverty created no room for human kindness and how the motivation of even the physician Mr. Treves had to be questioned, not by his peers, but first by a subordinate matron played by Wendy Hiller and then by himself.
This movie could be watched by teenagers but definitely not suitable for young children. It is the kind of film you can watch more than once. I watched again recently. It’s probably 5 years since I last saw it and there were powerful scenes like the reciting of the lines from Romeo and Juliet between Mrs Kendall and Mr. Merrick I’d absolutely forgotten the power of.
It is truly a beautiful piece of cinematic art that will touch anybody who likes deep, super deep story telling with gothic themes, historical backstory and enduring human emotions.
It runs for 2 hours 4 minutes and at release was categorised as a 12A