Anniversary of the Michael Jackson's Favorite Movie

On October 2, 1980, the premiere of David Lynch's biopic "The Elephant Man" took place in New York.

The film script is based on two books. The first is a book of memoirs by the famous British surgeon Frederick Treves. Only two patients brought national and even international fame to this doctor: King Edward VII and Joseph Merrick. It was Merrick who received the nickname "the elephant man" among the people, and it was to him that the book written by Frederick Treves - "The Elephant Man and Other Reminiscences", published in 1923, was largely dedicated. The second book - "The Elephant Man: A Study in Human Dignity", published in 1971, belongs to the pen of the British-American anthropologist Ashley Montagu (real name - Israel Ehrenberg).

The idea to create a film based on the biography of Joseph Merrick was given to Mel Brooks by Jonathan Sanger, who was Brooks' assistant on the 1977 film "High Anxiety". Although it is believed that Sanger himself was prompted by a certain babysitter, it is likely that Sanger simply wanted to create a film work that surpassed the theatrical production, which was going on with great success on Broadway at the time, based on the same literary sources. And Mel Brooks, who had recently started his own film company, Brooksfilms, needed a film that was both unusual and successful.

Terrence Malik was the first to be offered to direct the future film, but he refused. Then Sanger proposed David Lynch to Brooks. Brooks was not familiar with Lynch's works, and by that time Lynch had just a few in his background: several short films and one full-length - "Eraserhead" from 1977. This film was shown by Sanger to Brooks. The film delighted Brooks. The decision on the director was made.

But at the box office the first feature-length film by David Lynch almost failed: the box office was literally several hundred dollars higher than the cost of its creation. As a result, David Lynch was in a state close to depression. His condition was aggravated by his recent divorce from his wife. All together gave David Lynch the thought of leaving the profession. Therefore, at the moment when he was offered to become the director of the future film "The Elephant Man", he worked as a simple roofer. Brooks and Sanger's proposal literally brought Lynch back to life.

Anne Bancroft, Mel Brooks's wife, played one of the main roles in the film. When Brooks was interviewed 28 years later by the British newspaper The Guardian, he was asked who else was being considered for the role of Mrs. Kendal. Brooks answered: "She had already won the Oscar for The Miracle Worker (1962) and she was the producer's wife, so, no, she didn't have to audition. Are you crazy?"

But Mel Brooks forbade his surname to be indicated in the film credits. Prior to this film, he became widely known as a director of parody and satirical comedies, and therefore was afraid that his name in the credits would disorient the viewer. After all, the genre of a film can be defined in different ways, but not a comedy. For example, the New York Times film reviewer Vincent Canby said this about the film: 'The Elephant Man' uses some of the devices of the horror film, including ominous music, sudden cuts that shock and hints of dark things to come, but it's a very benign horror film, one in which ''the creature'' is the pursued instead of the pursuer."

In early 1981, "The Elephant Man" received 4 Golden Globe nominations, including two major nominations: Best Drama Film and Best Director. In both of these nominations, "The Elephant Man" and its director lost to the film "Ordinary People" and its director Robert Redford. The film "Raging Bull" and its director Martin Scorsese were the company of David Lynch's film and himself.

A little later the film "The Elephant Man" received 8 Oscar nominations. And here, in the main nominations, the same picture was repeated as at the Golden Globe. The decision of the American Film Academy did not receive any special objections from either film critics or experts. But the overwhelming majority of the film industry agreed that the film deserves an Oscar for makeup. A letter was even sent to the Board of Governors of the Film Academy asking for a special prize for the film by David Lynch. The Academy refused, but from the next, 1982, the nomination for Best Makeup appeared in the list of nominations. And all subsequent winners in this nomination owe their Oscars to the film by David Lynch, or rather, to the British makeup artist Christopher Tucker.

The makeup Christopher Tucker created for the main character in the movie "The Elephant Man" was not a figment of his fantasy. On the contrary, Tucker's merit is that he reproduced with scrupulous accuracy the real appearance of Joseph Merrick. After the death of the real Joseph Merrick, parts of his body were preserved for study by medical science. Some internal organs were stored in vessels; plaster casts were taken from his head, arms and legs. Although the organs were destroyed by German airstrikes during World War II, the casts have survived and are preserved to this day in a London hospital. The makeup of actor John Hurt, who played Merrick in this film, was created by Christopher Tucker directly from these casts.

How skillful and close to the original was Christopher Tucker's "creation" is evidenced by such a curious incident. John Hurt, the performer of the role of Joseph (John - as the authors of the film script renamed him) Merrick, kept the prosthetic cast in which he played in the film as a souvenir and kept it in the cupboard. And so, just a few years after the film was released on the screen, John Hurt, being outside the house, received a message from neighbors that an intruder had climbed into his house. Having urgently returned home, Hurt found that nothing had been stolen, only the cupboard door was open, and the prosthetic cast was lying nearby. That is, the kidnapper, opening the cupboard and seeing the cast, was so scared that he instantly forgot about the purpose of his "visit" and immediately retreated.

If in his homeland David Lynch's film was left practically without prestigious awards, then in Europe it achieved much greater recognition. In the UK, the film received 7 BAFTA nominations, of which it won three, including Best Picture and Best Actor (John Hurt). In the Best Director nomination, David Lynch was second only to Akira Kurosawa, director of the film "Kagemusha". By the way, in the Best Film nomination the British film academics preferred "The Elephant Man" to "Kagemusha".

In France in 1981, "The Elephant Man" won the Cesar Award for Best Foreign Film. In Japan, in 1982, David Lynch's film received a nomination from Japanese Academy Award for Best Foreign Film, but lost to Volker Schlöndorf's "Tin Drum".

Reviews of film critics for the film "The Elephant Man" were mostly overwhelmingly positive. Although the guru of American film critic Roger Ebert rated David Lynch's film as only two stars out of 4 possible and explained this low rating as follows: "I kept asking myself what the film was really trying to say about the human condition as reflected by John Merrick, and I kept drawing blanks. The film's philosophy is this shallow: (1)Wow, the Elephant Man sure looked hideous, and (2)gosh, isn't it wonderful how he kept on in spite of everything? This last is in spite of a real possibility that John Merrick's death at twenty-seven might have been suicide."

But the majority of Russian film critics highly appreciated the film "The Elephant Man". For example, Andrey Malov wrote in his review: "This film stands apart in the work of David Lynch: with its help, he kind of apologized for his past ("The Grandmother", "Eraserhead") and future decadent experiments - for his passion for savoring all kinds of physiological pathologies and deformities. On the one hand, Lynch seems to continue here the attack on one of the most ancient on-screen taboos - physiological deviation from the norm, on the other hand, he makes one of the first politically correct films advocating the protection of outcasts." Perhaps this is why Michael Jackson named this film by David Lynch among his favorite films.

The audience appreciated the film by David Lynch very highly, both in the 80s of the last century and today. This is confirmed by the data on the box office in the United States in the amount of $ 26 million, which is more than 5 times higher than his $ 5 million budget. 73% of IMDB and Kinopoisk users gave the film ratings from 8 to 10.

With that said, FilmGourmand rated David Lynch's "The Elephant Man" at 9.602, placing it 65th in the Golden Thousand.