Some actors have risen to fame playing Sherlock Holmes, such as Jeremy Brett and Benedict Cumberbatch. Others have been well-known names who've taken on the part, ranging as wildly from Roger Moore and Charlton Heston to Robert Downey Jr. Falling into the latter category is Tom Baker, best known as the Fourth Doctor in the BBC's long-running series Doctor Who. Not long after he departed the TARDIS, he took on the world's most famous detective in a BBC adaptation of the most famous Holmes story of them all. A production made by two of the people who had helped cast him as the Doctor: producer Barry Letts and script editor Terrance Dicks, now making Sunday Classic drama serials.
So with all that in mind, how well does this 1982 version of Hound of the Baskervilles stand up?
It certainly has plenty going for it. The famously eccentric Baker was a perfect choice for Holmes, bringing the right sense of wit, intelligence, and occasional humor to the role. True, there are times when Baker's Holmes seems oddly laid back, but even then Baker proves impossible to take one's eyes off of when he's on-screen. The production also wisely avoids, until toward the end, putting him in the cliche Holmesian outfit of deerstalker, cape, and so forth but, once they do, they prove an ideal fit for him. He's a fine Holmes, and it seems a shame that he never played the role again on-screen.
There are other things in its favor, as well. Much of the cast is solid in their roles, including Christopher Ravenscroft as Stapleton and another Doctor Who alumni, Caroline John, as Laura Lyons. Speaking of Lyons, a character often missing from adaptations of the novel (including the later 2002 BBC one), adapter Alexander Baron molds Doyle's original story to the screen rather faithfully, making the most use of two hours of screentime across four half-hour episodes. Combined with the ever high BBC standard for period costumes and sets, the result is a faithful and rather splendid looking adaptation of Hound.
But not a perfect one, by any stretch. As good as Baker and much of the cast is, there's some diabolically bad casting here too. Namely, in the rather flat performance of Terence Rigby as a borderline disinterested Watson or Nicholas Woodeson's Sir Henry Baskerville being decidedly brash and lacking in charm. Their performances, in particular, hurt the overall production since so much of the middle of the story rides on their shoulders. Elsewhere, as good as the sets and costumes are, Peter Duguid's direction comes across as satisfactory at best with very little effort to add flair to the standard BBC multi-camera production style of the era. The on-location scenes, shot on film, come across far better, even atmospheric in places, but there's one place where the production does let down: the titular hound making its attack at the climax. This production's hound is a creature that looks downright cuddly, utterly unconvincing as a thing of terror, despite the darkness around it and the attempt at an unearthly glow. Taken together, they knock an otherwise solid adaptation and production down a few pegs.
While it might not be the greatest or most atmospheric adaptation of Doyle's legendary Holmes novel, there's still plenty to recommend this 1982 version for having. From Baker's wonderfully eccentric Holmes to Baron's considerably faithful script, and the BBC's penchant for rich period details, of course, the pluses serve to outweigh the minuses more often than not. If nothing else, it's a chance to see "Who" out on the moor, as it were.
So with all that in mind, how well does this 1982 version of Hound of the Baskervilles stand up?
It certainly has plenty going for it. The famously eccentric Baker was a perfect choice for Holmes, bringing the right sense of wit, intelligence, and occasional humor to the role. True, there are times when Baker's Holmes seems oddly laid back, but even then Baker proves impossible to take one's eyes off of when he's on-screen. The production also wisely avoids, until toward the end, putting him in the cliche Holmesian outfit of deerstalker, cape, and so forth but, once they do, they prove an ideal fit for him. He's a fine Holmes, and it seems a shame that he never played the role again on-screen.
There are other things in its favor, as well. Much of the cast is solid in their roles, including Christopher Ravenscroft as Stapleton and another Doctor Who alumni, Caroline John, as Laura Lyons. Speaking of Lyons, a character often missing from adaptations of the novel (including the later 2002 BBC one), adapter Alexander Baron molds Doyle's original story to the screen rather faithfully, making the most use of two hours of screentime across four half-hour episodes. Combined with the ever high BBC standard for period costumes and sets, the result is a faithful and rather splendid looking adaptation of Hound.
But not a perfect one, by any stretch. As good as Baker and much of the cast is, there's some diabolically bad casting here too. Namely, in the rather flat performance of Terence Rigby as a borderline disinterested Watson or Nicholas Woodeson's Sir Henry Baskerville being decidedly brash and lacking in charm. Their performances, in particular, hurt the overall production since so much of the middle of the story rides on their shoulders. Elsewhere, as good as the sets and costumes are, Peter Duguid's direction comes across as satisfactory at best with very little effort to add flair to the standard BBC multi-camera production style of the era. The on-location scenes, shot on film, come across far better, even atmospheric in places, but there's one place where the production does let down: the titular hound making its attack at the climax. This production's hound is a creature that looks downright cuddly, utterly unconvincing as a thing of terror, despite the darkness around it and the attempt at an unearthly glow. Taken together, they knock an otherwise solid adaptation and production down a few pegs.
While it might not be the greatest or most atmospheric adaptation of Doyle's legendary Holmes novel, there's still plenty to recommend this 1982 version for having. From Baker's wonderfully eccentric Holmes to Baron's considerably faithful script, and the BBC's penchant for rich period details, of course, the pluses serve to outweigh the minuses more often than not. If nothing else, it's a chance to see "Who" out on the moor, as it were.