Sherlock Holmes in Washington
It’s been a long time since I’ve watch a Basil Rathbone Holmes movie. This is an example of why. While it’s not excremental, it’s pretty bad. In 1943, Holmes flies to Washington on the trail of a document stolen from a red herring courier who later shows up dead. Now, I can deal with an anachronistic Holmes, and I can mostly deal with rampant sloganeering of WWII hype, but this is such a weak script and terrible acting that it just throws all that in your face.
In the stories, Watson may have been a bit slow on the uptake, but he was not stupid. He was a physician and career army officer, after all. He just wasn’t a detective and wasn’t gifted at putting 2 and 2 together, so things had to be explained to him (and, by extension, the reader). Nigel Bruce’s Watson is a dolt and an imbecile. Rathbone is pretty good at projecting Holmes’ arrogance and conceit, but the interaction with Bruces’s Watson is one of barely concealed contempt. It’s nearly cringe inducing.
