Accessible Lynch

Rating: 10/10 (21 August 2019)

The main things that makes this film work so well is its theme and the way that Lynch, as a director, communicates that theme, not just verbally, but visually. The film loosely tells the story of a real man's, Joseph Merrick's, life. Luckily, Lynch understands, as do the best directors, that making a film is not about telling the facts. It is about communicating ideas and thoughts. As such, he does not confine himself to actual events, opting instead to try and communicate his own feelings about this man's life as he reacted to it.
Merrick, the 'elephant man,' played by John Hurt (1984), begins the film already in a cage. He is a circus side show, only for the especially brave. His appearance remains unseen to the audience but it is so ghastly that the carnival owner treats him simply as a beast and he behaves as one. A surgeon, played by Anthony Hopkins (Silence of the Lambs), buys the elephant man from the carnival owner and sets out to rehabilitate him, once he realizes that there truly is a man beneath that mass of malformed flesh.
It seems the stage is set for a miracle to occur. A little love and kindness, and the most deformed and hurting among us turn from monsters into men. At least, that is how most Hollywood films would go.
This is where Lynch's brilliance shines. He never lets us forget that John is a human being, but that very very few other people see him that way. As Merrick learns to dress, speak, and converse properly in society, there remains no cure for his deformity and so he simply becomes the subject of another sort of disgusting carnival show, this time playing at high society but never really belonging.
Lynch is the perfect director for a task such as this. His eye hones in on all of the ways that society, the surgeon, and the carnival owner all behave like animals toward Merrick. He sees the malformed human heart and holds it out for us all to see and examine. In the end we see that the film is not about transforming a near animal into a man, but about all of the ways that we, who have no outer scar, are deeply flawed within.