MEL BROOKS PRESENTS DAVID LYNCH'S ICONIC 'THE ELEPHANT MAN'

Anthony Hopkins in David Lynch's THE ELEPHANT MAN Year: 1980 Rating: ****

After the bleak B&W, nightmarishly bizarre ERASERHEAD, otherwise comedy producer Mel Brooks hired offbeat auteur David Lynch to provide 1880's England the same kind of Industrial-doomed, smokestack-bursting aesthetic...

Yet what's expected of Lynch's signature weirdness (before and after), THE ELEPHANT MAN mostly plays out like an against-the-odds high school bully flick...

Wendy Hiller and Michael Elphick in THE ELEPHANT MAN

As strategically sporadic moments where horribly deformed John Merrick... played by John Hurt, able to maintain a range of emotions while either buried in the physical prosthetics or a single-holed sackcloth... is hassled by various goading antagonists... 

Ranging from a circus owner to a maniacal night porter to a stuffy suit in a business meeting until either Hopkins' surgeon Frederick Treves, hospital chief John Geilgud, tough head nurse Wendy Hiller, and even a letter from the Queen of England to provide the kind of last-minute comeuppance-style rescue to make audiences not only relieved, but to exclaim "Take that, bully!" as if Merrick had defensively screamed "You owe me a year's worth of lunches!" alongside "I am not an animal!" 

Freddie Jones in THE ELEPHANT MAN

Opening (after a surreal ERASERHEAD-style intro ranging from roaring elephants to outer space) within the noisy/busy bedlam of post-Victorian England as drunkenly abusive, borderline sociopathic circus-master Freddie Jones is initially exploiting Merrick as star of his grungy circus freakshow... 

Looking straight from a Hammer thriller that cinematographer Freddie Francis would have either lit or directed decades earlier, Hopkins weaves within the ragged circus exterior to witness Merrick, who, for the first half, is seen only by onlookers within the film itself before we're allowed: building tension and suspense for the anticipated title character, initially re-exploited for medical reasons by Treaves himself...

Anthony Hopkins in THE ELEPHANT MAN

Providing Hopkins a genuine character-arc... although his transition from chilly medical manipulator to Merrick's stalwart protector happens too quickly within the first act, keeping the intense British icon from the kind of ambiguous edginess he's best known for...

Leading to what's eventually a gathering of sophisticated visitors, ranging from his classy wife (Hannah Gordon) to opera-house starlet Anne Bancroft... who in real life supposedly talked husband Brooks into producing: surreptitiously credited under BROOKSFILM so that a satirical comedy's not expected... 

Wendy Hiller, John Geilgud, Anthony Hopkins and John Hurt in THE ELEPHANT MAN

But the conventional feel-good elements far outweigh the art-house-driven tragic ones as Merrick’s often filmed in complaisant medium or wide shots rather than manipulatively melodramatic closeups, as if experiencing his life as an impartial observer...

Making THE ELEPHANT MAN more geared for audiences to celebrate than deliberately suffer through, which... centered on a true story that's overwhelmingly heart-wrenching on its own... creates a near-perfect comprise in David Lynch's most optimistic and engaging weird/dark movie.

Lesley Dunlop and John Hurt in THE ELEPHANT MAN

Anne Bancroft and John Hurt in THE ELEPHANT MAN

From David Lynch's THE ELEPHANT MAN

Anthony Hopkins in THE ELEPHANT MAN

John Hurt in THE ELEPHANT MAN

Hannah Gordon in THE ELEPHANT MAN

John Hurt in THE ELEPHANT MAN

Anthony Hopkins in THE ELEPHANT MAN

John Hurt in THE ELEPHANT MAN

John Hurt and David Ryall in THE ELEPHANT MAN

John Hurt and Freddie Jones in THE ELEPHANT MAN

Frederick Treves and Freddie Jones in THE ELEPHANT MAN