Customer Reviews

Sherlock Holmes: Voice of Terror [VHS]

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The story opens with a written disclaimer explaining why the famous Victorian-era detective is living and working in London of the 1940s. Sherlock Holmes' appeal is timeless, the producers claim, and he is quite capable of entertaining audiences in stories set during the then-present day. They are, of course, correct, although the real reason for updating him was that it allowed the filmmakers to produce a series of propaganda films wherein the greatest British detective of all time goes head to head with German spies. When the sleuth emerges victorious (as he must always), he can make a patriotic oration that parallels the real world situation (the "there's an East wind coming" speech from "His Last Bow" given here neatly ties in with the WWII theme). The format is a complete success. I love these films, as far removed from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's original stories as they are. They may get many of the details wrong, but they get the heart right, and they have exactly the correct atmosphere.

The beginning film in this Sherlock Holmes series as produced by Universal jumps right into its Sherlock Holmes vs. the Axis Powers motif. The British government is stumped. At regular intervals, a radio signal is beamed into England from somewhere in Germany. A pompous voice (of terror) gloats about terrible acts of sabotage that then simultaneously occur. The British Intelligence agency, unable to locate the source of the broadcasts or prevent the acts of terrorism is forced to call for Sherlock Holmes.

Many of the films in this series were less mysteries, and more straightforward thrillers. This is no exception. In fact, this is one of the weaker entries in the series as far as its plot is concerned. The storyline relies a bit too strongly on leaps of logic and sheer coincidences; the climax is just a bit too silly. If you're looking for a mystery in the style of the original Doyle stories, you'll be disappointed. There's too much that is held away from the audience, meaning that there's not much left for the viewer to figure out before the detective does.

But where this film succeeds is in its style, regardless of its actual substance. A lot of the story takes place in dark rooms, smoky bars and other sinister locales. The direction, lighting and cinematography are great. The scene in the saloon where Holmes (via a widow) turns a den of criminal elements into a force fighting for the Allies is particularly strong. The director plays the visuals for all they're worth; the craggy faces of the outlaws peering out of the dark, raising drinks to their lips, while Basil Rathbone's sharp features gaze out into the light. Scenes like this are what raise the film above the limitations of its plot.

The acting also serves to this film's advantage. Honestly, I could watch Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce reading the phone book. Yes, I realize that Bruce's interpretation of Dr. Watson is totally at odds with the original (in Doyle's stories, Watson, while not the equal of Holmes, is an intelligent and insightful character, capable of logic and independent thought; on the other hand, one wonders how Nigel Bruce's Watson manages to feed himself every day). But I don't care; I think the two of them are great fun and play off each other well. Henry Daniell makes the first of several appearances in the Sherlock Holmes movies here, playing a member of the intelligence council.

The DVD features are rather light (there aren't any), but the restoration that's been done to the print is astounding. The picture couldn't be any sharper and the sound is very crisp.

As the film reaches its conclusion, the plot holes become harder to ignore. It's a pity because the movie has so much going for it. It is worth watching though, just because it is so successfully stylish. The propaganda elements aren't at all distracting and in fact have become rather endearing as time has passed. This probably isn't the place for a newcomer to the series, as there are better films to choose from. But fans of these Sherlock Holmes films will almost certainly enjoy it as much as I did.

This entertaining little melodrama does a decent job of moving Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson from the Victorian comforts of Baker Street into the WWII London of blitzes and blackouts. I have been watching this movie off and on for over 30 years, and it has never looked as crystal clear as it does in UCLA's stunning print. Sound is sharp and clear, too, with some lines of dialogue understandable to my ears for the very first time. Speaking of dialogue, it's quite an indictment of today's Idiots-R-Us culture that a cheap B-movie from 60 years ago sounds like Shakespeare now. For example, when Basil Rathbone's Holmes reminds Thomas Gomez that the English believe every life has value, the sweaty little Nazi sneers "A quaint notion of an even quainter nation." Not bad. The plot purports to be based on Sir Arthur's wonderful endpaper Holmes story "His Last Bow," but it uses nothing beyond the villain's last name and the great closing lines. In its day, the British were outraged at this movie, with its suggestion of treachery and treason at the highest levels of government, and the country owing its salvation to the noble bravery of a prostitute. Doesn't sound so shocking now, does it?

I am writing this pre-review to express my Great Expectations and excitement over the upcoming DVD release of the 14 Sherlock Holmes movies made by Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce.
For those of us who have loved and worn out our VHS versions of these films, I am sure that I speak for many of us in expressing incredible anticipation and near shock that someone has finally recognized the need to release a "restored version" of these timeless classics.
We are told that they have been "Preserved and restored in 35mm by the UCLA Film and Television Archive." This is marvelous and I have already pre-ordered Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 from MPI Home Video.
I so hope that the entire 14 movies, are ultimately released in restored condition. Especially the rarest of them, "The Scarlet Claw" which has rarely been shown on televison and only been available on VHS sporadically.
To me and many others I know, Basil Rathbone is the definative Holmes. Not just because he looks alarmingly similar -as much as is humanly possible- to Sidney Pagets drawings of Holmes from the Strand Magazine illustrations, but mostly we love Rathbone because he portrayed the same Holmes that we as readers get through the buffer of Dr. Watson explaining away not magnifying Holmes' shortcomings.
Jeremy Brett chose to amplify every negative aspect of Holmes' personality that in the written versions Watson explained away. Rathbone's Holmes has been demeaned visciously over the past years and hopefully the respect and dignity that he gave his portrayals will be seen in all their accuracy and glory with these new digitally restored releases. ... these will have to be the best quality versions of these classics ever released...so for all of us who have cursed the incomprehensibly awful releases of these films over the years...our time has almost come. Show your support for this effort by ordering a restored version of American Film Histroy.
Much Thanks to UCLA, MPI, and Whoever was ultimately responsible for the idea of doing this!!!!

First of all, THIS is the copy of this film that you want to obtain. It's a nice clear DVD digitized by the UCLA film lab from a pristine black-and-white 35 mm print. All other copies are inferior to this one.

The stars here are Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce as Holmes and Watson. We also get to see the great Henry Daniell (as Sir Anthony Lloyd) and Reginald Denny (as Sir Evan Barham). The film was directed by John Rawlins.

The story takes place during WW II as the Nazis have formulated a plan to terrorize all England. The Voice of Terror makes radio broadcasts, informing the public of real-time disasters which their secret operatives have initiated right in the English homeland, ranging from blowing up airplane factories to wrecking trains, usually demolishing secret plans of the British offensive. The 'Inner Council' of British Army and Navy Intelligence seem to be stymied in dealing with the strikes so Sherlock Holmes is called in by the head of the council... but some of the Inner Council members clearly oppose this decision.

One of Holmes' street informants is murdered on the doorstep of 221B Baker Street (Holmes' flat) so Holmes and Watson head for Limehouse to discover the secret of the victim's last word: "Christopher".

In Limehouse, the two fend off attacks before they end up in a sleazy pub where Holmes has to prevail upon the victim's girlfriend ("Kitty") for help in unearthing the Nazi's plans. Kitty, in turn, has to convey an extemporaneous patriotic speech to the Limehouse street criminals in order to engage their help in discovering what "Christopher" means.

At one point, the Limehouse boys save Holmes' bacon but the chief Nazi escapes. It falls to Kitty again to save the day. In the meantime, Holmes is also suspicious of the respective Inner Council members as he is certain that one of them is an enemy agent.

The end is, again, a patriotic salute to the intestinal fortitude of the English, and to the brain of Holmes, in facing down their Third Reich adversaries.

This is a good film, coherently directed, and with good cinematography. While it's not up to the standard of the other series entries, such as "The Hound of the Baskervilles," it's still certainly worth watching.

Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson are at it again. This time they are trying to figure out a murderous voice (The Voice of Terror). Basil Rathbone is as good as ever as Sherlock Holmes, while Nigel Bruce is still exelent as the bumbling Dr. John H. Watson. This film might feel slow at points but makes up for the fact with some good twist and turns in the plot. After seeing it more then ten times the story gets old, but you start picking up on little thing. Look at Rathbone's face as Nigel Bruce acts like an bafoon...He's smiling!!

3.3 stars

Elementary...far too elementary, in fact.

Not a big fan of SHATVOT, the third of the fourteen Rathbone Holmes films. There's just not much to really like, apart from Basil's typically fine Holmes. SH has been transplanted to the 1940s, which is pretty ridiculous, Holmes being a true creature in so many ways of Victorian England, and the plot is quite basic. It's also barely 65 minutes long, more of a short than a properly developed film.

No one in the cast apart from Holmes stands out, and the script is hackneyed at times, based loosely on the Doyle story His Last Bow and other WWII propaganda tossed in for good/bad measure. Even Bruce's Watson seems flat and boring for the most part. If it wasn't for Rathbone, in fact, this would be pretty much unwatchable. But Basil is in his glory as Holmes as always, and he makes this entertaining solely by himself.

As a sidenote, I occasionally use subtitles in old films to figure out what a strong accent is saying, or just out of curiosity as to how they butchered the dialogue, as they so often do. This one's got some of the most hilariously bad subtitles I've ever seen, made by someone who had no clue about either this film or both the English and German languages. At one point a Brit says to a German, "Schiller, come here." The subtitles read, "Sheila, come here", despite "Sheila" being a six foot man. He continues as Sheila throughout. There are plenty of gaffes like that that are actually rather entertaining; if you get a chance, leave the subtitles on during the German scenes especially. Laughs abound.

The transfer by UCLA is good enough, neither the best nor worst of the series. If you're looking for a Holmes film, however, I'd put this right at the bottom of your Rathbone list, and would even watch some of Brett's Holmes first.

The first of the Rathbone WW II Holmes pictures is one of the more stylish productions in the Universal series. It looks great on this restored disc that highlights the moody lighting and striking close-ups.

After sporting slicked backed hair like the original Strand Magazine Sydney Paget drawings in his first two outings as Holmes for 20th Century Fox, here Rathbone has this odd comb-forward that makes him look like a 80s New Romantic singer. But he's commanding, not yet bored by the role.

Maybe this is one of the better entries because Nigel Bruce isn't overused. And Holmes' patriotic sign-off is still striring stuff.

Universal Studios enlisted Sherlock Holmes's aid against the Nazis when it made the unfortunate decision to update him to contemporary times rather than leave him in the Victorian era. Instead of the classic deerstalker, he sports greasy hair and a men's jacket of the time, which detracts from the iconic image with which so many viewers are familiar. The result is a middling propaganda piece about a Nazi saboteur that has a nice visual flair, yet suffers from the change of era. Somehow, fog-bound 1940s London is just not as romantic as fog-bound 1880s London. As always, Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce are wonderful in the lead roles, although it remains difficult to understand why Holmes would burden himself with such a dim-witted Watson. The theme of a shadowy terrorist causing death and havoc in the homeland resonates eerily with the concerns of today.

The first in Universal's series of Sherlock Holmes films, "The Voice of Terror" was widely condemned at the time of its release by critics who were offended by the studio's attempt to modernize the great detective for 1940's audiences whom, they believed, would consider Holmes irrelevant in the age of the Holocaust. Holmes resembles James Bond (not yet created) more than Arthur Conan Doyle's creation in this effort. He's less a private detective than a secret agent, working with the British government that is helpless in dealing with a series of taunting radio broadcasts that predict widespread destruction.

If this film is not true to Doyle (the credits claim the story is based on "His Last Bow," but other than the name of the chief villain and Holmes' closing remarks, there is no resemblance), it is nonetheless a fascinating time capsule that demonstrates the way Hollywood aided the war effort, using a beloved character from fiction to propagandize against the Nazi threat.

But the film has other virtues. Film scholars generally credit director Roy William Neill for the beautifully mysterious atmosphere that was as much an attraction of the Holmes series as Basil Rathbone's portrayal, but that atmosphere is apparent even here with John Rawlins at the helm. Much of "Voice of Terror" is cloaked in dark shadows that will make you forget the more awkward aspects of the screenplay. The scene in which Holmes and Watson visit a waterfront saloon is superbly staged with a noirish quality not found in 20th Century Fox's earlier Holmes adventures.

The dialogue also deserves praise, and as another reviewer pointed out, puts today's films to shame. Thomas Gomez makes an excellent villain, and, of course, Rathbone is brilliant, further putting his stamp on the role.

"There's an east wind coming, Watson," says Sherlock Holmes to his old friend, John Watson.

"No, I don't think so," says Watson, gazing across the channel from a high, ruined abbey. "Looks like another warm day."

"Good old Watson," says Holmes, "the one fixed point in the changing age. There's an east wind coming all the same, such a wind as never blew on England yet. It will be cold and bitter, Watson. And a good many of us may wither before its blast. But it's God's own wind nonetheless and a greener, better, stronger land that will lie in the sunshine when the storm is cleared."

I doubt even Churchill, much less Basil Rathbone, could do much with this hackneyed bit of hope-based meteorology.

Sherlock Homes and the Voice of Terror is a fine example of what happens when an excellent presentation of a character is turned into a low-budget franchise. Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes, after The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Sherlock Holmes - The Hound of the Baskervilles, was stuck with whatever the studio in question decided to do, invest money for a good script and a creative team or just try to wring ticket sales from a squeezed production budget and a journeyman production team. Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror, one of the Universal Studios-produced SH movies, is an example of the latter.

Universal put Holmes and Watson into WWII with this outing in part to cash in on a world war. For no apparent reason they gave The World's Greatest Detective a partial comb-over which makes him look like an aging, earnest Romantic Era poet. Watson has completed his descent into huffing irrelevance. His primary function now is to declare, "Great Scott, Holmes!"

Holmes has been brought in by Britain's Intelligence Inner Council, a group of five or so well-bred gentlemen with posh accents, which includes the fine actor, Henry Daniell, to find out who is the highly-placed German agent who has been sending top secret information to the Nazis. This information is used to create havoc in Britain by allowing key targets to be hit by saboteurs and bombs. Even worse, the Voice of Terror predicts these strikes during his broadcasts to the British people. If this continues, British morale may crumble.

Some of the Intelligence Inner Council doubt Holmes. Before Holmes solves the case - in only 66 minutes - we listen in to several meetings of the Inner Council while various issues are discussed intensely by aging British actors who came to Hollywood in the Twenties. We also meet Thomas Gomez. We visit that ruined abbey on the English coast. Many, many B movies, either through luck, some unknown chemistry or the sheer craftsman-like skill of the actors and creative team, are first-rate movies. Here, in my opinion, half the cylinders in the engine are duds The plot, the script and the actors (except for Rathbone, Gomez and Daniell) lack excitement and tension.

Still, nostalgia shouldn't be ignored. Although I think this is one of the duller in the series, I enjoyed it more than I thought I would. However, if you haven't seen The Adventures or The Hound, I'd suggest you start with them.

If you are a Rathbone/Holmes completist, be sure to get the MPI Home Video release. The UCLA Film and Video Archive restored it.