Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

Latest screen treatment of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's super-sleuth is about the neatest package in several attempts to make Sherlock Holmes exciting on the screen. It is considerably better than the last in this group and should prove a healthy buildup for others in this line of detective yarns. Picture will enjoy moderate grosses despite the handicap of weakie predecessors and absence of marquee draw.

Choice of Basil Rathbone as Sherlock was a wise one. Nigel Bruce as Doctor Watson is equally expert. With the two key characters thus capably handled, the film has the additional asset of being well conceived and grippingly presented.

Plenty of ingenuity is concentrated into two concurrent mysteries with the impossible clues not made too absurd or too obvious for mystery devotees. The "elementary, my dear Watson" type of dialog is soft-pedalled for more modern phrases or understandable patter.

The Holmes character seems tailored for Rathbone, who fits the conception of the famed book sleuth. Bruce's Watson at times is made a bit too mouthy and absurd, but in the main is generally good. George Zucco offers a splendid characterization as the arch-criminal and Ida Lupino is highly competent as the sole romantic figure in the mystery fable. Both in the lighter moods and when registering terror, she clicks nicely. Alan Marshal is too stiff and routine as the strange lover and the girl's solicitor. E. E. Clive furnishes a trim bit as a Scotland Yard inspector.

Realistic production marks the vehicle. Leon Shamroy has supplied several notable camera angles. Alfred Werker's direction is nicely paced and clear-cut. He never allows the action to drag even in the subdued episodes.

Wear.

Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

Outstanding Sherlock Holmes Picture Is Head and Shoulders Above Usual Mystery

Plot: The help of Sherlock Holmes (Basil Rathbone) is sought by Ida Lupino to protect her brother and herself from apparently the same impending death as carried away her wealthy father. They fail to save the brother, and protecting her nearly distracts Holmes' attention away from attempts by Zucco to get jewels from King Edward's crown in the Tower of London, which was what Zucco had planned. He also stages an apparently beaten effort to get the Star of Delhi ruby to further divert attention, but Holmes works through the tangled mass to trap his man on the Tower roof, and win a single-handed victory.

SUMMARY: Topped by Basil Rathbone's outstanding Sherlock Holmes characterization, with a class cast equal to any picture of this type yet produced and production values miles ahead of the ordinary mystery feature, this picturization of the famous Gillette play stands out as sure fire entertainment, with its audience appeal growing in direct ratio as the class of audience rises. Effective musical backgrounds and superior camera work have been substituted for the "clutching hand" sort of mystery to make this a picture with extra appeal to intelligent audiences. While Rathbone's Holmes does earn acting honors he gets real competition from Bruce's fine comedy as Dr. Watson, George Zucco's Professor Moriarty and—in short parts—E. E. Clive's police inspector and George Regas' flute-playing murderer. Tie this new screen version to Gillette's play, in which the late stage star toured the world several times, in publicity and advertising to interest older patrons. Start a pre-playing street ballyhoo using a tall, pipe smoking man clothed in regulation Sherlock Holmes costume. With vacations over, a tieup with the public libraries on listings and displays of Sherlock Holmes stories is timely.

OUTSTANDING: Gene Markey's production values.

Catchline: "Fiction's greatest detective in his greatest case."

—Showmen's Trade Review, August 26, 1939

Sherlock Holmes

Guaranteed—not one dull moment! this latest picturization of Sleuth Holmes' activities has enough thrills, chills and suspense to satisfy the most avid mystery-story fiend.

It's full of hokum—but such suavely presented hokum that any audience will take it and love it. The role of Holmes is again in the capable hands of Basil Rathbone, who seems to have such an elegant time himself snooping out incredible clues, that it would be an impossibility for any on-looker not to join in the spirit of the fun. Nigel Bruce as the blundering, jovial Dr. Watson is another happy choice. In the cast this time are also Ida Lupino, Alan Marshal and Terry Kilburn.

A murderous gentleman, George Zucco, determines to perpetrate a crime that will make Sherlock Holmes the laughing stock of London. Nothing could induce us to tell you the maniacal plans which Mr. Zucco conceives, but we can tell you this—he doesn't outwit the Holmes' super intelligence for very long. There's a romance, too, to give the customers their money's worth. Ida Lupino is the beautiful heroine who is shadowed by the fact that she will meet death any moment in the same gruesome manner which ended the lives of her father and brother. In short, "Sherlock Holmes" is a blood-curdler of the first order and mighty good entertainment—if you can take it!

Directed by Alfred Werker—20th Century-Fox.