Thursday, January 12, 2017

HOLMES OF THE MOVIES

HOLMES OF THE MOVIES: The Screen Career of Sherlock Holmes. David Stuart Davis. Bramhall House; 1978. Foreword by Peter Cushing.

This entertaining book on movies featuring the famous character Sherlock Holmes has chapters on silent films such as The Murder On Baker Street;  the stage adaptation Sherlock Holmes starring William Gillette; early interpretations of Holmes played by Clive Brook, Reginald Owen, and even Raymond Massey; Arthur Wontner, considered one of the best of the early Holmesian thespians; and, of course, the most famous of actors to play Holmes, Basil Rathbone. Rathbone's many Holmes films are covered, and there are additional chapters on TV series starring Ronald Howard and Peter Cushing; the Hammer film The Hound of the Baskervilles, also starring Cushing; sixties films such as Sherlock Holmes and the Deadly Necklace and A Study in Terror; Billy Wilder's The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes; and more recent films that have had anything to do with the character, such as The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes' Smarter Brother. Knowledgeable and engaging, Holmes of the Movies is loaded with great photographs.

Verdict: All you could want to know about Sherlock Holmes on film, on stage, and on TV. ***.

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