Les Masques de la mort

A now retired Holmes (Peter Cushing) is called on one last time to assist Scotland Yard with a strange case, that they can shed no light on. Three bodies have been found, one in the Thames and two others in Whitechapel, all bearing a hideous look of fear on their faces, but all showing no signs of cause of death. Holmes is intrigued enough to take the case and with Watson (John Mills) in tow he sets out to solve it. However before he can, he is called on by the Home Secretary (Ray Milland) and a stranger who wants to keep his identity to himself, their plea is for assistance in the case of a missing German envoy, his disappearance, they claim could cause the outbreak of War between England and Germany. The stranger is Graf Udo Von Felseck (Anton Diffring) a German diplomat close to the Kaiser, Holmes impresses Von Felseck as he deduces both his name and his political affiliation. Holmes takes the case and soon finds himself mixed up with a plot to kill millions, he also gets involved with "That Woman" again, one Irene Adler.(Anne Baxter) Pretty decent TV movie from Tyburn films, with a good intricate plot and a fantastic cast, Cushing even this late in his career shows he still had the mental and physical agility to take on the role.

Above all else, this TV movie was most welcome for giving Peter Cushing a chance to end his acting career on a high note and in one of his most celebrated roles (he appeared in one more film after this one but this was to be the last lead role of his long career). He'd first played Sherlock Holmes twenty-five years previously in a Hammer movie, and then in a 1968 BBC television series. Here, he revisits the character in a later stage of life and, accordingly, this time his rendition of the great detective is less agile and prone to moments of impatience and tetchiness. Cushing is just one of a number of senior actors in the cast, many of them sadly fast-approaching the end of their careers... Anne Baxter, Gordon Jackson, Anton Diffring... Ray Milland also sadly was not in great health at the time and it shows. Nevertheless, all give very good performances as one would expect from such distinguished names. The piece is nicely filmed with good location work and the music is okay too but unfortunately everything is let down by the plot. Much of the narrative involves Holmes and Watson investigating a supposed kidnapping which ultimately proves to be nothing more than a red-herring, conceived to keep Holmes distracted from another more important matter. One can't help wondering if it would have been easier for the villains to have simply assassinated Holmes if they were so worried about him bringing them to justice. And once this duplicity is discovered, the characters involved just vanish from the action and the story suddenly shifts to a climax that is, in itself rather unsatisfying. Why do Holmes and Watson, two ageing men, risk their lives in flushing the villains out of their lair when the police apparently have the whole place surrounded anyway?

It was a nice idea to see a more elderly Holmes in action for once and even better to have Peter Cushing playing him once again, and it's a shame that plans for a proposed follow-up never came to fruition, because a better story might have worked wonders. A good attempt that just doesnt quite come off.

One of the main reasons for purchasing this movie on VHS was because Peter Cushing is in it, who makes a good Sherlock Holmes.

Sherlock Holmes comes out of retirement to investigate some strange murders in London's sewers. He teams up with Dr Watson once again. The the case takes them to Buckinghamshire. They end up back in London and down the sewers again, they discover a lab where poison gas is being made and these people are responsible for the murders and are arrested.

This movie is worth having just for the cast alone, many of them ageing: Peter Cushing (The Curse Of Frankenstein, Star Wars), Sir John Mills (Scott of the Antarctic, Tiger Bay), Ray Milland (The Man With X-Ray Eyes), Anton Diffring (Circus of Horrors, The Beast Must Die), Gordon Jackson (The Great Escape, The Ipcress File), Anne Baxter (I Confess) and Susan Penhaligon (The Land That Time Forgot). All play good parts. Of these people, only Sir John Mills and Susan Penhaligon are still alive today.

I enjoyed this movie ans is worth looking at.

Rating: 3 stars out of 5.

'The Masks of Death' was Peter Cushing's swansong as Sherlock Holmes, a character he had played opposite Andre Morell in a Hammer 'Hound of the Baskervilles' and then in a television series for the BBC opposite Nigel Stock.

Here his Watson is an elderly John Mills, and the two make a charming pair presenting Holmes in his later life as a beekeeper who is tempted out of retirement to help an old friend, policeman McGregor (Gordon Jackson). It soon becomes apparent that more urgent matters require the intervention of the great detective when the Home Secretary (Ray Milland) comes to call with a foreign dignitary (Anton Diffring). And to complicate things, still further, The Woman has returned to London (Irene Adler of course, played by Anne Baxter).

As a plot goes, 'The Masks of Death' is rather pedestrian and not that involving. But with a cast like this, who can complain? Cushing is more crotchety than he had been in his previous outings in the role, but Mills proves a fine foil - his Watson is definitely the army man, a man of action. Baxter is luminous, and even when the solution is staring us in the face there's still enough going on in the interplay between the actors to keep us interested.

If you're a fan of traditionally British suspense and cult cinema, it's pretty much impossible to dislike this modest, made-for-TV Sherlock Holmes oddity. In the mid-80s, long after the heyday of British studio-horror, veteran Roy Ward Baker directs his former Hammer regular Peter Cushing as he depicts Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's creation Sherlock Holmes for one last time. Cushing played Holmes in the fifties ("The Hound of the Baskervillers") and in a TV-series of the sixties, so for this occasion, the super-detective is allegedly retired, but still in close contact with his good buddy Dr. Watson and Scotland Yard inspector MacDonald. The latter begs Holmes to help with a curious case of three dead bodies that were discovered in the Thames. The corpses show no signs of physical violence, but the expression on their faces indicate that they died of pure fear. Before Holmes can properly start to investigate, his services are confiscated by the British Home Secretary and a dubious German ambassador named Von Felseck. They urge Sherlock Holmes to find a young German prince who went missing from Von Felseck's residence, as his disappearance might lead directly to a war between Germany and England. "The Masks of Death" certainly isn't the greatest Sherlock Holmes story ever penned down (it's not even based on an A.C. Doyle original, in fact) but it's tense and compelling enough to keep you guessing along with Holmes and Watson. It's quite far-fetched and implausible, but there are a several inventive plot twists and scenes with plenty of action. Holmes' retirement age also turns out to be an ingenious gimmick, as he's occasionally less observant, sharp or subtle. Especially his thoughts on strong, opinionated women are chauvinist and old-fashioned.