Sherlock Holmes - Das Zeichen der Vier

This was the worst Holmes film I have ever seen, and I see there are more of the same to come.

The Main players, with the exception of Thaddeus Sholto were badly miscast, Frewer, who I quite like, and who was excellent as the Trash Cam Man in The Stand, borough a silly zany quality to Holmes that just shouldn't be there.

Watson, who is about the same age as Holmes, appeared old enough to be his father.

THe accents were somewhere between poor and awful, especially inspector Athenly Jones, he seemed to be a cross between English/Scottish/Welsh/Irish Jewish and Red Indian, it was awful.

In all, a wasted Exercise, and down there with 'The evil beneath Loch Ness' in the really crappy film stakes.

I bought the four movie mini series from my local DVD store. I didn't watch it for about 5 months. It sat on my table collecting dust. I threw out my back and had nothing to do but watch movies. When I popped this in i expected an okay movie. I was treated to a very humorous take on the classic character. When I read Sherlock I always had the vision of him prancing around baker street very restless. Doyle even refers to him as feline at several points. In my opinion there hasn't been a more fun version of Holmes done yet, though I haven't seen them all. Serious fans don't seem to enjoy it because of the humor brought to the film, yet in his stories Holmes always seems to be on top of things and has a very slight dry sense of humor which they magnified in this movie. All together a enjoyable film. In response to the person who thinks watson is too old, remember that watson had time to go to med school, finish it up and go to a war, come back and live in a bottle for a while before he met holmes who was still at school if i remember correctly.

At first Matt Frewer's Holmes portrayal is irritatingly precise and priggish. But then we see a warmth not very often seen in the detective especially towards his friend Watson at the end of this production. I enjoy watching Frewer's wide letterbox mouth that he works a little bit like old British comedy star Will Hay. He also has a habit of lifting his eyebrows like Hay. Frewer's Hound of the Baskervilles had been too comic so it was good to see a more sober production in this Sign of Four follow-up. There are a couple of prize harridan types that briefly entertain us in this one. Mrs Benstone scrutinizes Holmes through her pince-nez glasses as though he is an imposter. Mrs Smith comes later in the lengthy anachronistic Dr Crippen joke. There are some good horse and carriage in foggy gas-lit sequences that are classic Holmes mystery scenarios. The usual riverboat chase scene of the Sign of Four story is forsaken for a stand-off on fogbound dockyard jetties. Even though this is not the best version of Sign of Four it entertained me enough to want to see it again sometime.

Matt Frewer has played Sherlock Holmes in four TV movies: The Hound of the Baskevilles, The Sign of Four, The Royal Scandal, and The Whitechapel Vampire. I purchased a DVD set of all four of Frewer's Holmes films to share with friends and family. We planned to watch only one movie per evening, but we ended up watching all four in one weekend. It was just too much fun! Matt Frewer's performance as Sherlock Holmes is extremely humorous and Kenneth Welsh is the perfect straight-man for Frewer's highly eccentric Holmes. These are fun adventures for the entire family. Frewer and Welsh should make more movies as Holmes and Watson. They are a blast!

The Sign of the Four was wonderfully filmed and excellently acted. Matthew Frewer has a new, fresh take on Holmes that is different from Jermey Bret's serious almost depressed character of Holmes. Frewer's Holmes knows he's smart and has a bit of fun with it. He makes jokes about other characters without them even knowing about it and he has a fun sense of "Yes I know I'm brilliant .... I'm Sherlock Holmes" to his acting.

The character of Holmes is kept true to the original stories and the film has you intrigued with this Holmes character until the credits role. wonderful I would recommend the series to any one who enjoys Sherlock Holmes. Superb.