La Femme en vert

So why would a serial killer sever a finger from each of his victims. It's a real puzzler that Holmes must solve before the bodies pile higher. Solid entry in the Holmes series that holds interest throughout. Note how well mounted Holmes' room is at 21 B Baker St. It's full of the kind of interesting clutter expected of an eccentric like the great detective. In fact, the whole 70 minutes is an aesthetic pleasure to look at, helped along by producer-director Roy William Neill's imaginative camera angles. Note too the suggestive dialogue in the opening lounge scene, unusual for a popular programmer of the time. And what a great pair of cold-hearted schemers Hillary Brooke and Henry Daniell make in their duel of wits with Holmes. Still and all, I thought the screenplay went too far in poking fun at Nigel Bruce's Dr. Watson. The series always played him for comic relief, but here he's made to look especially foolish in the hypnotism sequence. He is, after all, a doctor of medicine, an accomplished professional. Too bad Neill died not long after this production. For I suspect it was his guiding hand that maintained the general superiority of these little features to many others of the time.

The police approach Sherlock Holmes when someone is killing young women in London and neatly severing one of their fingers. Holmes investigates and finds that several well known people appear to be suspicious. A late night visitor gives him the motives for the crimes, if not the method - officially thought dead, Professor Moriarty is framing these people for the murders and then black mailing them to keep it hidden. Sherlock doesn't capture him on this occasion but begins to try and stop whatever master plan he has.

Rathbone will always be the image I have of Sherlock Holmes and it is down to these films. Here he gets involved again with archenemy Professor Moriarty in a game of murder and blackmail. The film has all the usual stuff in it and fans of the series will enjoy this. The plot doesn't quite have a fluidity to it and stutters and starts here and there. The murders start well with danger and dramatic possibilities but it loses a bit of momentum when the tact changes to a more pedestrian pursuit of the woman of the title.

Aside from this it does all it needs to do to be enjoyable (as a fan). Rathbone is a great Holmes and he is a good gentleman detective. I always have a problem with him being so very aloof but it is part of how Watson is portrayed I guess. Bruce is good as Watson, even if it does bother me to see him put down so very often. The film misses the comedy presence of Hoey's detective Lestrade and the new officer can't fill his shoes. Daniell's Moriarty is a bit too average - I never got the impression of an evil or dangerous man who was a match for Holmes.

Overall this is a good entry in the series. None of it screams out as being of a very high quality but it does well enough aside from having areas where it could easily have been strengthened.

I'm a big fan of the Basil Rathbone/Sherlock Holmes series. This review is of the restored black and white 35 mm version issued in 2003. Having watched all of the Holmes films on TV or videotape, with bad prints and lousy sound, this restored version is the one to see. The restoration is perfect and shows the visual beauty of the film which is without question.

Basil Rathbone immortalized Sherlock Holmes in 14 films. The Woman in Green was the 11th in the series. There is a hint of tiredness in Rathbone's portrayal in this one. The story is interesting and involves severed fingers, the sinister Professor Moriarty and the mysterious Woman in Green. Henry Daniell is a good Professor Moriarty and Hillary Brooke as The Woman in Green is mysterious and seductive. As always, Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce as bumbling Dr.Watson are fun to watch.

At 68 minutes the film is short. As with all Holmes films, we wish for more. By all means see it.

"The Woman in Green" (1945) as directed by Roy William Neill is an unusually intelligent and satisfying thriller. Reliable Bertram Millhauser wrote the original screenplay, adding elements from several of Arthur Conan Dyle's stories including "The Empty House" to an interesting but rather gruesome mystery. The plot-line involves murders of young woman from whom a finger has been surgically removed after they have died. Enter Sherlock Holmes, asked to help by Inspector Gregson, who along with his Scotland Yard colleagues is being pressed by their Boss to get results on this series of disturbing killings. Gregson takes the murders of vulnerable young women hard, adding to the seriousness of their number and frequency. Sherlock Holmes, the world's first consulting detective, is moved also and suspect his old nemesis in the matter--except that the man has been reportedly executed in Montevideo. The solution to the case end by involving Holmes with one of the suspects who turns out to have been a victim, the man's daughter, a lethal mastermind, threats against Holmes's companion Dr. Watson's life, and a sinister climax that finds Holmes walking a tightrope between life and death as his friends hasten to rescue him. Director Niell has made few errors here, and makes clever use of shots from several stories high to set up an effective climactic scene As Holmes, Basil Rathbone is unusually heroic and effective throughout. Nigel Bruce is given a rather peripheral role with low-grade comedic bits that he does flawlessly. Henry Daniell is his thoroughly professional self as the mastermind, especially when he invades Holmes's Baker Street apartments for a eerie discussion with his chief adversary. Paul Cavanagh and Hilary Brooke are each given varying moods to play and do them very well indeed. Others in the case have smaller parts and vary in their effectiveness. I find two errors in the handling of a logical storyline. One comes when Maude Fenwick, daughter of a victimized father, is given no reaction to the discovery that he is involved in the series of murders; the other is the static nature of he shots in a nightclub-restaurant that might have been handled by panning with Holmes and the Inspector. Apart from these cavils, I suggest that this is an entertaining trip into mystery, mayhem and mesmerism. One worth more than one study as it is perhaps one of the best of the Rathbone-Bruce Sherlock Holmes series of adventures.

Sherlock Holmes (Basil Rathbone) and Dr. Watson (Nigel Bruce) step in to help Scotland Yard when a series of murders hits London. They're all women and their right forefingers are missing! It seems an evil, beautiful woman named Lydia (Hillary Brooke) and Prof. Moriarty (Henry Daniell) have something to do with it...

Very good entry in the series. It's well-done with some very inventive direction (for this series) from Roy William Neill--especially during the hypnotism scenes. Rathbone is good as always; Brooke is very beautiful and just great and Daniell seems rather subdued. Bruce once again plays Watson as a buffoon--but I blame the screenwriters more than him. And we don't have the annoying Inspector Lestrade in this one.

Worth catching.