Review – Sherlock Holmes in Terror by Night

The title implies that something terrifying happens during the course of the production, when in truth barely anything happens at all. Holmes and Watson are set to the task of guarding the famous Star of Rhodesia diamond on a rail journey from London to Scotland. The resulting murder, theft and assorted misdemeanors all take place inside a train car or two. Though I’m sure this saved money on sets, it tended to limit the plot a bit. Mildly amusing

Review – Sherlock Holmes in Pursuit to Algiers

After outings battling Nazi plots to take over the world, Holmes seems only moderately challenged by this garden-variety series of assassination attempts. Our heroes serve as bodyguards for minor royalty on a boat voyage from England to Algiers. The would-be killers are inept, and the drama is occasionally interrupted by musical interludes. The result isn’t exactly one of the world-s greatest detective’s finest moments. Mildly amusing

Review – Sherlock Holmes in Dressed to Kill

This is the last of the Universal Holmes and Watson pictures starring Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce. Apparently Rathbone was so sick of the role that he refused to do it anymore after this. If the scripts he was getting weren’t any better than this one, I for one don’t blame him. The crime here is one of the most elaborate the genius of Baker Street ever faced: a convict knows the location of currency printing plates stolen from the Bank of England, and he’s somehow managed to encode the location into the tunes played by three music boxes. But before his partners in crime can pick them up at auction, the boxes are bought by other bidders. And so the chase is afoot, with Holmes trying to unravel the riddle and track down the boxes before the vicious criminals can get their hands on them. However clever the scheme might have been, unfortunately it doesn’t make for a particularly interesting story. Too bad one of the best series in mystery movie history ended on such a mediocre note. Mildly amusing

Review – Sherlock Holmes and the Scarlet Claw

Though this is basically The Hound of the Baskervilles relocated to Canada, it’s still a fun Holmes adventure. While in the Great White North for a discussion about the supernatural, our heroes find themselves caught up in a mystery surrounding a murderous moor monster. In one particularly eerie scene, Holmes is pursued across the bog by a “specter” wearing luminous clothing, a strange use of special effects for this otherwise fairly low budget series. The final turn of the screw turns out to be a bit lame, but otherwise this is one of the better entries in the set. Mildly amusing

Review – Sherlock Holmes and the Pearl of Death

Here’s an interesting twist: Holmes under public pressure to remedy his own blunder (or at least apparent blunder). A thief make off with the priceless Borgia Pearl during Holmes’s demonstration of the ineffectiveness of the security system designed to protect it. Fleeing hot pursuit, the thief conceals the pearl in the wet plaster of a bust of Napoleon, one of a set of six in a workshop. So our heroes end up in a race not only to recover the pearl but also to stop the bad guys from murdering the people who bought the busts. One of the highlights of the picture is The Creeper, a sinister killer played by Rondo Hatton. Mildly amusing

Review – Sherlock Holmes and the House of Fear

After a string of “original” plots, this Holmes flick is actually based on a story by Arthur Conan Doyle. A group of gentlemen pool their life insurance into sort of a tontine. So really it should have come as a surprise to none of them when they start to die one by one, each murder heralded by an envelope of orange seeds. The final twist has a somewhat illogical Murder on the Orient Express flavor, but otherwise it’s a decent outing. Mildly amusing

Review – Sherlock Holmes in Washington

In my review of Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror I griped about Holmes and World War Two propaganda being an uneasy mix. Here the famous detective once again finds himself transported to contemporary times and pitted against Nazi spies. But at least this time around he actually gets to use his wits to solve the crime and save the day. Fearing attack by enemy agents, a British document courier sneaks a microfilm-laden matchbook into the purse of an unsuspecting woman. So we get not only some solid sleuthing by our hero but also some fun sequences in which people pass the matchbook back and forth unaware of its importance. If given a preference, I like Holmes better in his original Victorian surroundings. But if he has to be sucked into the 20th century and pitted against the Axis, at least this picture sports a plot that’s more his traditional style. Mildly amusing