A Filmmaker's Review: Autopsy S3 E1 - "The Last Hours of Elvis Presley" (2014)

"The Last Hours of Elvis Presley" is a show that deals with the death and autopsy of the King of Rock and Roll. It is a part of the 'autopsy' TV series which deals with investigations in to the deaths of the world's biggest stars such as: Whitney Houston, Michael Jackson and of course, Elvis Presley. The mysterious natures of the deaths happen to be not only the part and parcel to the documentary, but also how they lived their life is just as important.

Elvis Presley's death, as everyone knows, was felt as like a shockwave all over the planet. It was one of the biggest events of the 20th Century and so, it was covered worldwide as being a result of Cardiac Arrest (Heart Attack). But, as the doctor states that nearly everyone dies ultimately of Cardiac Arrest, this couldn't be the only reason for the death of the King. When the investigation digs deeper, they find that Elvis's health was in great, great turmoil in almost every single organ in his body - they were shutting down, and shutting down until he died. And then this begs the question of whether the drugs were the main cause of his death.

When going through the final hours of his life, it explains that Elvis took multiple drugs in order to get to sleep and to treat a toothache. There were also suggestions that Elvis was suffering horribly in terms of pain and so, was taking Codeine - but not necessarily just for the toothache. It was very clear that Elvis had some very certain problems that were more than just the drugs he was taking and all of these were a secret.

The next part of the documentary goes through every single major health problem that Elvis had both mentally and physically. He had depression, still suffering over the death of his mother over a decade before, he had anxiety about who he was - the King, he had something wrong with his eyes which he needed medication for, he had something wrong with his lungs, his heart, his veins, his weight, his bowels and many more things wrong. These were all part and parcel to his death.

Elvis was all in all not a well man, but in the documentary, it does say that the drugs played very little role in his death - in fact they were only the catalyst to it. Elvis ultimately died of his own health problems, having rigor mortis set in by the time the body was found. They still tried to revive him and I found that extreme. Nobody wanted Elvis to die, but performing CPR on him when his body has already gone into rigor mortis is so extreme I cannot fathom what the people there were thinking at the time. It must have been complete pandemonium.

Ultimately, this documentary teaches us that there are so many things that lead to a person's death that you may not see any problems with someone but, they are probably suffering horribly. Elvis was a playful, nice man in the hours before he died. He was talking and laughing with his friends, he had a game of tennis and he sang a few songs including "Unchained Melody". Elvis was in good mental shape before he died but simply couldn't get to sleep and stay asleep - atop of this he had the health problems. It also teaches you that you could be looking someone right in the eye and have no idea what they've been taking or whether they've been taking anything at all. Ultimately, the drug that was the catalyst to Elvis's death was codeine. It stopped him from using the bathroom properly and so, his health problems just all exploded at once - killing him almost instantly.

Another thing that this teaches us is that someone's death, in what they're taking and their health problems, could be going on for years and years before the person actually dies. You could be 40 and not even know the fact that when you're 42, you'd be dead because of the fact you're just not looking after yourself, your life is upside down and your medication is up in the air. It is just an incredibly heartbreaking story. Elvis's death though, apparently began over a decade before - when he suffered a great loss by his mother's death.