The Doctor and the Devils (1985) on Netflix
In 1828, Dr Thomas Rock lectures on anatomy and needs cadavers. His assistant Dr Murray pays body snatchers for them. Robert Fallon and Timothy Broom overhear what the school pays.
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- Netflix1.6/5
- IMDb6.2/101,664 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes0%
Trailer
Plot summary
Dr Thomas Rock is a respected anatomist in 1828, teaching at a prominent medical school and passionate about improving medical knowledge. He believes the ends justify the means. The laws of his time leave the profession with very few cadavers, so the medical establishment turns to body snatchers, known as Resurrection men, to supply extra specimens. The buying falls to Rock's young assistant, Dr Murray, who is allowed to spend a small fortune, especially on fresh corpses. When Robert Fallon and Timothy Broom, two alcoholic miscreants, learn what the school pays for bodies, they start killing locals and selling the bodies.
Cast
- Nichola McAuliffeas Alice
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Doctor and the Devils (1985)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- The film is based on the true story of William Burke and William Hare, who murdered at least 16 people in 1828 Edinburgh, Scotland, and sold their bodies for anatomical dissection.
- Mel Brooks, a lifelong horror fan, bought Dylan Thomas's unproduced screenplay through his Brooksfilms company and hired Freddie Francis to direct. Brooks wanted only to reuse the title, but Francis pushed for the original script, so Ronald Harwood was brought in to adapt it.
- Nicholas Ray planned a 1965 version with Maximilian Schell in the lead, but shooting was delayed by weather and then Schell quit in December 1965 after alleging the producers had not paid him; Laurence Harvey was set to replace him.
- Freddie Francis wanted to shoot the film in black-and-white; to get a monochrome look on color stock, he and cinematographer Gerry Turpin used Turpin's "LightFlex" system, a lens-mounted device that pre-exposed the film stock.
- Freddie Jones, who had appeared in The Elephant Man, was offered a role in the film but turned it down.
