Review of The Elephant Man (1980) by Angela B — 25 Sep 2009
One of the most beautiful and depressing movies i've seen in my entire life. the story centers around john merrick (john hurt), a severely disfigured man, tentatively called the elephant man, who has suffered with his condition for his whole life.
as he began his own life, he traveled with a circus around britain performing as a sideshow attraction, with his brutal master bytes (freddie jones) who frequently beats him, and other sideshow acts. naturally, he is disgusted with his own appearance, as is everyone else, and when in public hides behind a bag worn over his head.
he is soon discovered by a surgeon named fredrick treves (anthony hopkins), who is interested in him and wants to try to help him with his problems. bytes obviously doesn't want to give away his most prized possession, so, treves responds by threatening to go to the authorities for bytes' treatment of john.
treves takes john to his hospital and cares for him, helping him accept himself, giving him courage to speak, and introducing him to many other people to help him gain friends. bytes is obviously not amused, and, through a series of events involving another worker at the hospital, finally seizes john back into his circus.
after the others in bytes' circus see how he treats john, they help him escape, but when john enters the real world, he finds that people still are not ready for someone with his appearance. he finds his way back to the open arms of treves, and starts his semi-normal life again, eventually earning him a standing ovation in a theater near the end of the movie.
john hurt and anthony hopkins make an amazing duo as john merrick and fredrick treves, as their characters explore the depths of human kindness, courtesy, willingness, love, and in merrick's case, innocence.
on the other end of the spectrum, bytes shows his complete inadequacy for compassion and kindness, making john live in a hellhole and treating him like a slave. david lynch outdoes himself with his first actual film, other than eraserhead, which is a completely confusing, bizarre masterpiece of art.
there are not many movies like this anymore, that truly show the depth that the human soul can go. I highly recommend this to anyone.
This review of The Elephant Man (1980) was written by Angela B on 25 Sep 2009.
The Elephant Man has generally received very positive reviews.
Was this review helpful?
