Dir: Roy William Neill | Cast: Basil Rathbone, Miles Mandar, Evelyn Ankers | Drama, 1944, 69’
Possibly the most fondly recalled of Universal’s Sherlock Holmes adaptations. Directed with his usual casual excellence by Roy William Neill aided by fluid photography by Virgil Miller.
As played by Basil Rathbone Holmes gets opportunities both to demonstrate his mastery of disguise and his virtuosity on the violin before matching wits against a formidable adversary in the form of Miles Mander as master of malevolence Giles Conover, who with the assistance of resourceful femme fatale Evelyn Ankers and Rondo Hatton as the Hoxton Creeper schemes to lay his clammy mitts on a priceless pearl “with the blood of twenty men upon it down the ages”. @RichardChatten
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