The Doctor and the Devils

The Doctor and The Devils is a gothic thriller produced by Mel Brooks production company Brooksfilms and released in 1985. It is based upon the true story of Burke and Hare, who in 1828 Edinburgh, Scotland, murdered at leastpeople and sold their bodies for anatomical dissection. The film stars Timothy Dalton as Dr. Thomas Rock a character based on the reallife Dr. Knox, to whom Burke and Hare supplied bodies and features Jonathan Pryce and Stephen Rea as Fallon and Broom, characters based upon Burke and Hare. The film was directed by Freddie Francis, and features a script adapted by Sir Ronald Harwood from an unproduced screenplay by Dylan Thomas.

Brooksfilms founder and executive producer Mel Brooks, a lifelong horror fan, acquired the rights to Dylan Thomass unproduced screenplay The Doctor and the Devils first published in 1953 in the hopes of adapting it into a horror film. He hired director and former cinematographer Freddie Francis, who during the 1960s and 70s had directed a series of horror films for famed British horror productions companies Hammer and Amicus. Brooks original intention was to simply use the title of the Thomas screenplay, but Francis pushed for a closer adherence to the original script. A compromise was arranged with playwright and screenwriter Ronald Harwood adapting Thomass more cerebral work into something more genrefriendly. Despite the adaptation, much of Thomass original dialogue remains.The film was produced by Jonathan Sanger, who worked on a number of Mel Brooks films. Brooks himself is credited as Executive Producer. The soundtrack was composed by John Morris with vocals from In Tua Nua, and includes the song Whisper and I Shall Hear, featuring vocals by actress Twiggy. Many involved in the production including Brooks, Sanger, Morris, casting director Maggie Cartier, and director Francis then working as a cinematographer had previously worked on Brooksfilms highly successful The Elephant Man in 1980. ........

Source: Wikipedia