Garp's Franchise Film reviews

[TM2YC]

BONUS: 'Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Silk Stocking' [2004]

An otherwise minor role is played by a well-known face, which sort of gives the game away slightly - the 'who' in the whodunnit is obvious.

It worked so perfectly when it was originally broadcast because the actor in question was nobody at the time (3-years before his first film role). They artfully had him in the background throughout but you never guessed he was the killer... but now it's "Hey isn't that...!" first time he's on screen .

The score was great no?

 

[Garp]

BONUS: 'Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Silk Stocking' [2004]

An otherwise minor role is played by a well-known face, which sort of gives the game away slightly - the 'who' in the whodunnit is obvious.

It worked so perfectly when it was originally broadcast because the actor in question was nobody at the time (3-years before his first film role). They artfully had him in the background throughout but you never guessed he was the killer... but now it's "Hey isn't that...!" first time he's on screen .

The score was great no?

Yeah, I read afterwards that it was an early role for him. Boy done good, I thought.

I think I have something lacking in my brain because I never hear scores, for some reason. I wish I could. It's all just part of the background noise to me. I feel I'm missing out on a whole cinematic experience when I read people's comments about soundtracks.

 

[Garp]

'The Woman in Green' [1945]

Young women are turning up dead in London. The motive is unclear and each has a finger cleanly removed after death. It's up to Holmes to solve this serious and perfunctory mystery.

I read Basil Rathbone's autobiography recently ('In and Out of Character') in the hope of uncovering some interesting anecdotes about his Holmes' films. There are none. In fact, he glosses over the whole franchise in a few sentences, perhaps embarrassed by them. (The book is still interesting, nevertheless.) Despite this omission, I am gladdened that Rathbone still put his all into the role, even at this late stage. There's still a spring in his step here, although perhaps this is the first in which he appears a little tired.

The film is more sombre and a little less fun because of it. Dennis Hoey as Lestrade was probably deemed too comical a role for this entry, and so we have a wooden Matthew Boulton as Inspector Gregson instead. Hillary Brooke and Henry Daniell reappear from previous films in new roles, and both are adequate to good. The mystery is OK, the reveal is OK but the cinematography is excellent in places, with reflections in water and high camera shots. It passes the time amiably enough overall, I suppose.

For fun, I watched bits of a colorized version I found online after my B&W blu-ray copy; don't bother - it's awful.

 

[Garp]

'Pursuit to Algiers' [1945]

I try to watch these films with an open mind, avoiding other reviews beforehand. Nevertheless, I managed to pick up from somewhere the opinion that this is one of the lesser Holmes efforts. With that expectation in mind, I was pleasantly surprised when the film gets off to a cracking start. The manner in which Holmes' services are engaged is ingenious, albeit fanciful, but fitting for such a master detective. Holmes must ensure that a prince of Made-Up-Land is escorted safely back from his private school in England to take up the throne. Naturally, there are nefarious elements out to stop him.

Unfortunately, 'Pursuit to Algiers' reputation is fully on show when Holmes and Watson set sail. There are too many red herring characters amongst the passengers, which becomes unnecessary halfway through when the real villains materialize anyway. From then on, we are treated to their comically inept attempts to kill the prince, reminiscent of the USA trying to off Castro.

The filmmakers perhaps realised that they were working with a thin plot, and so decide to pad it out with a few musical numbers courtesy of a Brooklyn songbird (who has her own goes-nowhere subplot). Even Watson gets to sing - lipsynching or dubbed, I couldn't tell - in a bonny Scottish brogue.

The film ends on a nice enough twist, but it wasn't really worth the effort, unfortunately.

 

[Garp]

'Terror by Night' [1946]

Rathbone, Bruce and Hooey on a train. It's difficult not to think of 'Murder on the Orient Express' while watching this film, as it has a definite Christie vibe. Holmes is tasked with ensuring that a famed diamond is returned safely to Scotland. Rather quickly, the owner is murdered and the jewel swiped. Holmes must use his superior deduction skills to work out which of the shady characters in the carriage is the thief/murderer.

This is a sprightly hour-long picture, made rather cheaply, I'd imagine, with lots of stock footage and shots of model trains. Unintended comic relief is provided by Renee Godfrey and her extraordinary accent - is it Cockney? Eastern European? I have no idea. But it kept me amused nonetheless.

Rathbone largely seems to be phoning it in this time. He's not bad, but not memorable here either. The mystery jogs along merrily and has an OK climax, albeit contrived and unlikely. Not the best Holmes you can see, but entertaining enough if you're short on time.

 

[Garp]

'Dressed to Kill' [1946]

Rathbone's & Bruce's last hurrah as Holmes and Watson see them on the trail of villains on the trail of musical boxes. The boxes, produced in Dartmoor prison, seem to connect somehow to the theft of banknote plates from years past. Can H&W locate all 3 boxes, stop the killings and ensure that England isn't flooded with illogically large white fivers?

'Dressed to kill' ends the 14-film franchise with neither a bang nor a whimper. It's solid middle-tier stuff, only nudging the higher reaches due to some excellent acting. (Edmund Breon as Watson's old school chum 'Stinky' is particularly and appropriately slimy, and Patricia Morison holds her own as the femme fatale.)

The plot is so-so - I liked the idea of the music from the music boxes being a clue rather than the actual execution of it - but there isn't enough here to keep you entranced. The ending is abrupt, actionless and feels lacklustre; perhaps they weren't aware at the time that the curtain was to come down for good, I suppose.

Despite (and in many cases, because of) Bruce's bumbling portrayal of Watson, I've enjoyed this franchise enormously. There have perhaps been more accurate depictions of Baker Street's finest detective in other media, but I think Rathbone still wins out for me.

 

[Garp]

Next up: I'll be tackling Hammer's 10 film franchise of Dracula. I hope to start next week, though we'll be moving then, so we'll see if I'll have everything set up OK in time.

 

[TM2YC]

Next up: I'll be tackling Hammer's 10 film franchise of Dracula. I hope to start next week, though we'll be moving then, so we'll see if I'll have everything set up OK in time.

 I was about to give that a go soon too, or at least some of them. It'll be interesting to read your thoughts. You can't beat Cushing and/or Lee. I thought were 9 films, as listed on this Wikipedia page. Did they forget one? Did the series go madder than kung fu Dracula?

The Brides of Dracula (1960)
Dracula: Prince of Darkness (1966)
Dracula Has Risen from the Grave (1968)
Taste the Blood of Dracula (1970)
Scars of Dracula (1970)
Dracula A.D. 1972 (1972)
The Satanic Rites of Dracula (1973)
The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires (1974)

Hope the move goes well and your boxes of Transylvanian soil turn up in Whitby without incident.

 

[Garp]

Next up: I'll be tackling Hammer's 10 film franchise of Dracula. I hope to start next week, though we'll be moving then, so we'll see if I'll have everything set up OK in time.

 I was about to give that a go soon too, or at least some of them. It'll be interesting to read your thoughts. You can't beat Cushing and/or Lee. I thought were 9 films, as listed on this Wikipedia page. Did they forget one? Did the series go madder than kung fu Dracula?

The Brides of Dracula (1960)
Dracula: Prince of Darkness (1966)
Dracula Has Risen from the Grave (1968)
Taste the Blood of Dracula (1970)
Scars of Dracula (1970)
Dracula A.D. 1972 (1972)
The Satanic Rites of Dracula (1973)
The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires (1974)

Hope the move goes well and your boxes of Transylvanian soil turn up in Whitby without incident.

Thanks! Yeah, I’m cheating a bit and including ‘Kiss of the Vampire’ - not strictly Dracula but close enough.

 

[TM2YC]

I’m cheating a bit and including ‘Kiss of the Vampire’ - not strictly Dracula but close enough.

Ah, sounds good enough to me. From the Wikipedia entry on KotV:

"Originally intended to be the third movie in Hammer's Dracula series... it was another attempt by Hammer to make a Dracula sequel without Christopher Lee... The film's climax, involving black magic and swarms of bats, was originally intended to be the ending of The Brides of Dracula"

Same guy doing the music as most of the Dracula series too. That 1963 film does explain the big gap between 1960 & 1966 in an other wise steady flow of Dracula films from Hammer.

It's on youtube, nice.

 

[Garp]

‘Dracula’ AKA ‘Horror of Dracula’ [1958]
 
Jonathan Harker, part-time librarian and full-time vampire hunter, turns up at Count Dracula’s castle with visions of rearranging books and possibly killing his host. Neither of these events occur, however, and soon we are introduced to Dr. Van Helsing who takes up the vampire-hunting reins, if not the book-keeping duties.
 
The first of 9 (or 10) Dracula/Vampire films produced by the legendary Hammer Film studio, ‘Dracula’ sets the scene with its creepy Gothic tone and its leads – Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing. Both are inspired casting. Lee is handsome and suave with a hypnotic sexual energy. It’s impressive that he can do so much with so little – he is surprisingly absent for much of a film that bears his name and probably learnt his lines during a lunch break. Yet, those entrances! He hovers, broods, looking 8 feet tall.
 
Cushing is no slouch here either. He is an athletic Doc, rushing around, armed with stakes and crucifixes. He merrily slaps hysterical women and prescribes wine after a blood transfusion. Like Lee, much is done facially, showing the cogs whirring in his brain.
 
In comparison, the remainder of the cast are a touch melodramatic (including the great Michael Gough, alas) but Miles Malleson is a fun comic relief as an undertaker. The film teases the horror until the climax, with a few blood splatters, and the sex is relegated to heaving cleavages at this stage. The settings are great and, unusual for me, I noticed the score quite a bit – it gets VERY LOUD in places.
 
I read an abridged version of Dracula many, many years ago and I can’t say now how accurate this version is, but it ticks all the boxes I expected a Dracula film to include. I thought it dragged a little when Lee is offscreen, but I could charitably put it down to how tired I was when I watched it. ‘Dracula’ kicks off my new franchise watch on a high.

 

[Garp]

BONUS: 'Nosferatu' [1922]

Even if you've never seen this silent film before, you'll probably recognise some of the iconic scenes. F. W. Murnau directs his unofficial adaptation of Bram Stoker's 'Dracula', changing names to (unsuccessfully, as it happens) try to avoid copyright infringement.

Maybe because it's German or because it's silent or both, but this is one seriously creepy film. It's a tribute to Murnau that a film nearly 100 years old can still make you want to look behind you nervously as you watch it. Every shot is so perfectly framed and beautiful - the scenes of the approaching ship especially so. Murnau plays so much with shadows - on walls ascending the stairs and over the heroine's heart - that it seems like a cliche until you remember when this was made.

Max Schreck is the ideal vampire. He seems to stretch himself grotesquely, with his elongated fingers and nails. The shot of him watching from the window is genuinely unnerving. I could well believe, as posited in 'Shadow of the Vampire' that Schreck had inside knowledge of his character.

The version I watched (the Kino Lorber blu-ray, with English subtitles for the German intertitles) was tinted, sometimes from shot to shot, with yellow, green, blues, reds... Distracting at first, but enjoyable once I had got used to it.

 

[Garp]

BONUS: 'Shadow of the Vampire' [2000]

'Shadow of the Vampire' is a difficult film to review as I'm not certain what it intends to be. It's a fantasy-biopic, which is also funny and horrific, but altogether entertaining. The premise is that Max Schreck, the actor who portrayed Nosferatu in the 1922 film of the same name, really was a vampire. Murnau the director, fanatical to achieve realism, cast him with this in mind yet failed to inform the rest of the cast and crew. What follows is a comedy of errors as Murnau tries to rein in Schreck's natural tendencies while still capturing his masterwork on film.

Is this supposed to be taken seriously? I don't think so, and it is indeed very funny in places. And yet the leads bring such intensity to their roles that it's hard to tell sometimes. John Malkovich and Willem Dafoe are such a delight to watch, Malkovich especially as a director slowly losing control. Dafoe quite easily becomes a vampire but is a tad over-the-top in places. Cary Elwes is marvelous as a gung-ho photographer but Eddie Izzard appears to be pantomiming for one of his stand-up routines most of the time.

Like 'Confessions of a Dangerous Mind' not only did it keep me amused but I left hoping it was all true.

 

[Garp]

BONUS: 'Nosferatu the Vampyre' [1979]

Werner Herzog recreates the 1922 silent film with none of the legal entanglements Murnau faced. Here Nosferatu is unambiguously Count Dracula, and other characters retain Bram Stoker's original names. The film follows Murnau's closely, only much, much slower - Kinski doesn't appear until nearly half an hour in.

This is very much a film of its time, looking and feeling 1970s through and through. If you like that dreamy, ethereal look to your films (I do not) then you're in for a treat. The setting is great - all Dutch canals and windmills - and Kinski brings a loneliness and pathos to his Nosferatu. Unfortunately, others do not fare so well. Isabelle Adjani does nothing worth watching with an admittedly weak role.

Herzog gets to play around with an arguably more interesting ending, and there are definitely creepy moments, but I can't see me choosing to rewatch this over the original. Apparently there's a sequel - 'Vampire in Venice' - which I may have to check out just for completism.

 

[Garp]

BONUS: 'Nosferatu in Venice' AKA 'Vampire in Venice' [1988]

This quasi-sequel to 'Nosferatu the Vampyre' sees Klaus Kinski return as the unkillable bloodsucker, this time with a shock of white hair and normal teeth, for the most part. It's worth checking out this film's entry in Wikipedia, as it seems the production is far more fascinating than the dirge I watched last night.

Professor Catalano (Christopher Plummer in a Van Helsing role) has been summoned to Venice to investigate the possibility that Nosferatu has been, or is about to be, resurrected. When he quickly deduces that this notion is false, a seance is organized to conjure him up anyway. Nosferatu rises in Spain (it appears) and makes his way to Venice for some unfinished business, mostly involving killing people and/or seducing women.

Considering the frequent changes of director and the apparent sh!tstorm Kinski provoked on set, it's a wonder that the film is as coherent as it is, in the most part. Plummer and Donald Pleasence (as a priest) are both good here, though obviously wasted and slumming it. Kinski shows none of the lonely pathetic figure he portrayed previously, seeming content instead to swan around Venice looking thoroughly pissed off to be there. The scenes of his sexual assault of several nude women are uncomfortable to watch, especially in light of their traumatic memories of the filming.

Venice looks good throughout, as it should, and a lot of vampire trope boxes are checked off here - bats, rats, wooden stakes, crucifixes, etc. In other circumstances, something wonderful could have come from this. Instead, we get a rapey, non-horrific, morose vampire movie, free to view on Tubi if you so desire.

 

[TM2YC]

^ Thanks for the great review. Every time one reads/hears something about Kinski, you hate him even more. What a horribly talented, horrible man. You've watched that one so I don't have to .

 

[Garp]

'The Brides of Dracula' [1960]

A Dracula film without Dracula? Why not. Instead we follow Baron Meinster, an undead groupie, as he expands his harem. Peter Cushing revisits his Van Helsing role, complete with his little black bag of tricks.

'The Brides of Dracula' is not a bad film but it suffers without the overarching presence of Christopher Lee. Instead we get David Peel who comes across as a demonic member of the Von Trapp Family Singers. Yvonne Monlaur as his newest bride is beautiful and French throughout, and Cushing is even more athletic here, cauterizing his own wounds like a spiritual Rambo. However, two side characters steal the show - Freda Jackson as housekeeper (I could watch a whole film involving her character) and Miles Malleson again, this time as a rapacious local doctor.

The sets - especially the climatic windmill - are good and overall I had a good time. With Lee, though, this could have been something really special.

 

[Garp]

BONUS: 'Billy the Kid versus Dracula' [1966]

R.L. Stine, the author of the 'Goosebumps' series of books, says he starts with a title and then writes a book around it. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the studio behind 'Billy the Kid versus Dracula' didn't just do the same. This Western-themed vampire flick finds Dracula in the Wild West, for reasons unstated, who then suddenly finds himself enamoured of Billy the Kid's fiance, Betty. Usual vampire shenanigans (with a few liberties) ensue.

I was expecting a 'so bad it's good' kind of movie, but it isn't quite that. It's not laughably bad and despite its obvious cheapness, it's produced well. It comes across as a bizarre episode of 'Bonanza'. The sets and acting, generally, are adequate to good. John Carradine has a Legosi look about him, but doesn't do much with it. His frequent hypnotic stares (complete with glowing red face) skirt the Ed Wood territory I was expecting. Chuck Courtney plays a reformed Billy the Kid (Billy the Young Adult?) who has turned his back on his gunslinger ways and has become a foreman on a ranch. Melinda Plowman is a winsome love interest. Virginia Christine as a superstitious (and rightfully so) German immigrant maid is probably the only one who demands attention.

There are some interesting things going on here - Dracula merrily struts around in broad daylight, doesn't need a coffin for sleeping and leaves four puncture wounds in his victims rather then the usual two. He's still invisible in mirrors and repels from crucifixes, so he has that going for him, at least. Also (and I am far from a Western connoisseur) I don't remember seeing the local doctor being a late-middle-age woman before, which was cool.

This is a strange film. It is almost scare-free, completely failing as a horror, but doesn't have enough action to qualify as a straight Western for me either. It's a curiosity, not without a certain unique charm, but I'm not sure whether that justifies seeking it out. If I were to watch it again, I could do worse than pair it with 'Valley of Gwangi', another Western curiosity in my collection.

 

[TM2YC]

^ What is it with Billy the Kid and vampirism?

One of the oddities in the filmography of Alan Clarke (who I'm planning on watching more of very soon) is a 1987 musical about a snooker match against a vampire called 'Billy the Kid and the Green Baize Vampire'. I haven't got round to seeing it myself yet. It's on youtube and looks nuts:

 

[Garp]

^ What is it with Billy the Kid and vampirism?

One of the oddities in the filmography of Alan Clarke (who I'm planning on watching more of very soon) is a 1987 musical about a snooker match against a vampire called 'Billy the Kid and the Green Baize Vampire'. I haven't got round to seeing it myself yet. It's on youtube and looks nuts:

I remember when this came out, at the height of the snooker craze. 'The Green Baize Vampire' was a veiled reference to Ray Reardon, one of the top UK players at the time. I don't recall whether Billy the Kid was based on anyone. Never saw the film, though.