Best Line: “Would you like to hear uncle make a noise like a duck?”

Score:

In their final outing as Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce are in fine form matching wits with a femme fatale hell-bent on collecting three nondescript music boxes that may hold the key to toppling the British economy. No pressure there then. Along the way, Holmes faces mortal danger but never flags in his determination to crack the secret of the boxes and beat the enemy to the prize – a hidden stash of stolen currency engraving plates. Just remember to Serpentine, Shel! No, that’s spelled correctly; IN-LAWS, anyone? Ah well, moving on…

Rathbone not only inhabits the fastidious figure of Holmes like he was born to play the role, he manages to make tangible the slow, deliberate calculation through which Holmes pieces together a sinister plot and unravels the mystery. Similarly, while Rathbone seems as sharp and analytical as you would expect from the famous sleuth, Bruce’s Watson is the very model of a stereotypical blustery Britisher, huffing and puffing and throwing away lines left, right and center. Their camaraderie is palpable, particularly after the actors have been through so many of these productions together. And for all Watson’s apparent ineptitude, he’s still there to provide Holmes with the spark of an idea to propel the case forward. Watson’s reaction to the loss of his friend Stinky early in the film is also very heartfelt and endearing.

I honestly can’t recall any more whether I once heard or read that Basil Rathbone hated working with children or if it was just an assumption made because of his Holmesian persona. Certainly in SON OF FRANKENSTEIN, he demonstrates a wonderful if possibly over-acted enthusiasm when sharing scenes with Donnie Dunagan as his son Peter. But it still seems forced, and so it does here again, if a bit less so, in a brief scene in which Holmes and Watson rescue a little girl from confinement in a closet. Rathbone’s Holmes comforts her surprisingly well, but moving away to instruct Watson and leave the doctor to look after her while he resumes his investigation, you see Holmes’ façade of warmth drop immediately. Is that Holmes betraying his true nature, Rathbone doing the same, or both? We’ll never know, but it works well within the context of the story in any event.

There’s also something enticing about seeing Holmes up against a woman, not least because the character seems exactly the sort of man who would consider himself superior to the opposite sex. But perhaps as a further indication of his advanced intelligence, he never underestimates his female foe. He does however take considerable glee in parroting some of her own words back to her in the film’s final moments. Patricia Morison has the unenviable task of making her Hilda Courtney not only seem like a competent criminal mastermind but a worthy foil for Holmes in the absence of an arch-foe like Professor Moriarty. Fortunately, she manages quite well.

Universal’s Rathbone/Bruce run can’t be seen as anything less than a successful experiment, even if the notion of Holmes traipsing around 1940s London still seems a bit odd. DRESSED TO KILL (a title that doesn’t seem to have any bearing on the actual film, mind you) is a fine way to say goodbye to this classic team.

ATB