Nicholas Meyers' tale bring the neurotic, drug-addicted Sherlock Holmes together with the Father of Psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, in turn-of-the-century Vienna. (Actually Prague.) It's one of those novel ideas that people have during a bull session and too many lattés. Other films have pitted Holmes against his contemporary, Jack the Ripper, but though the notion has promise it's never worked too well because, after all, Jack the Ripper got away. One pastiche had Holmes a visitor from the future. They will stop at nothing.
There are pitfalls in any story that makes companions of two famous people, even if one of the characters is fictional. Mainly, giving too much weight to one or the other in the plot, inducing an imbalance that leaves one of the characters not much more than an observer. It doesn't happen here. Meyers gives both geniuses equal time. And they both complete their tasks. Holmes solves a somewhat cloudy mystery. Freud cures Holmes of his addiction AND his neurotic obsession with Professor Moriarty, played with mousy disquiet by Lawrence Olivier, whose skill hasn't declined with age.
The supporting cast does well enough. Samantha Eggar, she of the elegant yet sensual features, is the wife of Doctor Watson, Robert Duvall, with a vaudeville British accent, something like Chico Marx's Italian accent. Jeremy Kemp is outstanding as the anti-Semitic Baron von Leinsdorf. He's a great German, even if he's English. He's better at being a German, usually a nasty one, than most German actors, with the exception of Otto Preminger. I revel in Kemp's pebbly complexion and haughty demeanor, though. And he's done superb work in more demanding roles, as in "The Blue Max."
The German accent of Anna Quayle, as Freud's housekeeper, is as ludicrous here as it was in "Casino Royale." John Addison's musical score isn't overdone. It's apt and sometimes bumptiously comic, as during the tennis duel between Freud and von Leinsdorf. The art direction and set dressing are convincing. (Plenty of brass, scarlet carpets, and delicate green ferns.) Prague has recently been a serviceable stand in for other European cities, since it was never bombed into oblivion during the war and you can still find ancient buildings and cobblestone streets. Somebody got Freud's Vienna street address right -- Berggasse 19. The façade even LOOKS like Freud's real residence.
Vanessa Redgrave appears as a kidnapped soprano who is tracked down by Holmes, Freud, and Watson. The climax has two speeding old-fashioned trains chasing one another and a saber duel atop one of the cars. Not a moment of it is to be taken seriously. Holmes solves his case, the kidnapped beauty; Freud cures his case, Sherlock Holmes
There are pitfalls in any story that makes companions of two famous people, even if one of the characters is fictional. Mainly, giving too much weight to one or the other in the plot, inducing an imbalance that leaves one of the characters not much more than an observer. It doesn't happen here. Meyers gives both geniuses equal time. And they both complete their tasks. Holmes solves a somewhat cloudy mystery. Freud cures Holmes of his addiction AND his neurotic obsession with Professor Moriarty, played with mousy disquiet by Lawrence Olivier, whose skill hasn't declined with age.
The supporting cast does well enough. Samantha Eggar, she of the elegant yet sensual features, is the wife of Doctor Watson, Robert Duvall, with a vaudeville British accent, something like Chico Marx's Italian accent. Jeremy Kemp is outstanding as the anti-Semitic Baron von Leinsdorf. He's a great German, even if he's English. He's better at being a German, usually a nasty one, than most German actors, with the exception of Otto Preminger. I revel in Kemp's pebbly complexion and haughty demeanor, though. And he's done superb work in more demanding roles, as in "The Blue Max."
The German accent of Anna Quayle, as Freud's housekeeper, is as ludicrous here as it was in "Casino Royale." John Addison's musical score isn't overdone. It's apt and sometimes bumptiously comic, as during the tennis duel between Freud and von Leinsdorf. The art direction and set dressing are convincing. (Plenty of brass, scarlet carpets, and delicate green ferns.) Prague has recently been a serviceable stand in for other European cities, since it was never bombed into oblivion during the war and you can still find ancient buildings and cobblestone streets. Somebody got Freud's Vienna street address right -- Berggasse 19. The façade even LOOKS like Freud's real residence.
Vanessa Redgrave appears as a kidnapped soprano who is tracked down by Holmes, Freud, and Watson. The climax has two speeding old-fashioned trains chasing one another and a saber duel atop one of the cars. Not a moment of it is to be taken seriously. Holmes solves his case, the kidnapped beauty; Freud cures his case, Sherlock Holmes