His take on the heartbreaking story of Joseph Merrick made his career – but is the late director’s least typical film also his greatest?

I am not an animal. I am a human being. I am a man,” John Hurt screams late in The Elephant Man while being chased by a mob.

The play is about the cruelty Merrick endures as the sideshow freak dubbed “Elephant Man,” and the compassion he receives from the more open-hearted souls in his orbit. “The Elephant Man” won the Tony ...

Adjusting their reported domestic box office to about $11/ticket (current average), his second and third films - "The Elephant Man" (1980) and "Dune" (1984) - stand out above all others.

With such hallucinogenic masterworks as 'Eraserhead,' 'Blue Velvet,' 'Mulholland Drive,' 'Twin Peaks' and 'The Elephant Man,' ...

Mel Brooks then hired Lynch to direct 1980's "The Elephant Man," which chronicles the life of a severely deformed man (played by John Hurt) living in 19th-century London. It garnered eight Oscar ...