BEFORE: At this point, I can't remember a time when I wasn't watching Sherlock Holmes movies, so that's a definite sign that I've watched too many. I'm eager to be done with this chain so I can move on to something, anything else. Basil Rathbone carries over for film #10 in this series.
THE PLOT: Sherlock Holmes investigates a series of deaths at a castle, with each foretold by the delivery of orange pips to the victims.
AFTER: This one's a cut above the others, I think, partially because it's based on a true Sherlock Holmes story, "The Five Orange Pips" (a "pip" is a seed, by the way...) and because even though I have read that story, I didn't remember the conclusion, so the twist came as a nice surprise. You probably won't be able to figure out the case here before Sherlock does, unless of course you're familiar with the original short story.
There are notable differences, however, between the original story and the filmed version - here Holmes and Watson are contacted by an insurance company after seven rich gentlemen all move to a house in Scotland and form a club of sorts, called "The Good Comrades", with the men all acting as each other's beneficiaries where their life insurance policies are concerned. You'd think that would be a red flag right there, or that the insurance company wouldn't allow anyone to be named as a beneficiary unless they were related to the policy-holder. But let's assume for a minute that someone at the insurance company was asleep at the switch" that day when this was approved.
When one of the gentlemen gets a message delivered during dinner, containing seven orange seeds, that man is then found dead, and horribly mutilated. A few days later, another member of the club gets a delivered message that contains SIX orange seeds, and he meets the same gruesome fate - that's when Holmes and Watson are called in. The situation then becomes something like Agatha Christie's "Ten Little Indians" story, with the people in the house being bumped off, one by one. Holmes seems unable to stop the burning and crushing of the club members, until they're down to just two. Well, the solution seems simple, right? Just wait for the next-to-last man to die, and whichever man's left standing, there's your killer.
Thankfully, it's not that simple. And then a murder occurs in town, one that doesn't seem to fit the pattern at all, what's going on there? A few other things don't seem to add up either - like why warn people that they're about to be murdered? And then, once warned, why do the men who receive the messages STAY in the house, instead of running for the hills? And why doesn't anyone pay closer attention to who's coming to the house and slipping the messages under the door? Why not position someone at a window where they've got a good view of the front door?
Also starring Nigel Bruce, Dennis Hoey, Holmes Herbert, Harry Cording, Wilson Benge (all carrying over from "The Pearl of Death"), Aubrey Mather (last seen in "Mrs. Miniver"), Paul Cavanagh (last seen in "The Scarlet Claw"), David Clyde (ditto), Sally Shepherd, Gavin Muir (last seen in "Sherlock Holmes Faces Death"), Florette Hillier, Cyril Delevanti (last seen in "The Night of the Iguana"), Richard Alexander (last seen in "Follow the Fleet"), Doris Lloyd (ditto), Alec Craig (last seen in "The Spider Woman").
RATING: 5 out of 10 Singapore tattoos
No comments:
Post a Comment