Sherlock Holmes: Une étude en rouge

Sherlock Holmes became such a quick fixture in motion pictures that it is possible to write studies on the various movies and actors centered on that character.

This particular film was an early Hollywood take on Holmes in the sound period. It is interesting to note that it came out only three years after Sir Arthur Conan Doyle died in 1930. By the time this had come out Hollywood had done silent and sound films about Holmes with William Gillette, John Barrymore, and (more recently) Clive Brooks. But the three best Holmes' of the sound period were still to come along: Arthur Wontner in Great Britain, Basil Rathbone in Hollywood, and Jeremy Brett (on television). Holmes in this version was Reginald Owen, best remembered for his "Ebenezer Scrooge" in the 1938 version of "A Christmas Carol". Owen was a very good character actor (villainous in films like "The Call Of The Wild", but funny as anything in "The Good Fairy"). He had played Watson already, so he was one of the few actors to essay both friends parts. But he seemed too laid back to be a good Holmes.

"A Study In Scarlet" appeared in December 1887 in "Beeton's Christmas Annual", a long forgotten magazine in Great Britain, which is only now recalled because of Conan Doyle's novella. If you are lucky enough to stumble onto the Beeton's of that month and year (and it is the original) than hold onto it - it's worth many thousands of dollars.

It's in two parts. The first half is "The Lauriston Gardens Mystery", wherein Dr. John H. Watson (our narrator) introduces us to his friend and roommate Sherlock Holmes, and then to the adventure (set in April 1881) where he first became aware that Holmes was a consulting detective, and was consulted by Scotland Yard's Detectives Tobias Gregson and "G." (no further name ever given) Lestrade (not "Lastrade" as the movie's cast of characters named him). Lestrade would be the best known of the detectives in the saga who would consult Holmes (and would be most memorably played by Dennis Hoey in the Rathbone films). Here he's played by Alan Mowbray - not badly but with little electricity.

The plot of the first portion of the novella is about the murder of two men, one by poison and one by a knife wound in the heart. Holmes traces the story back to the old west, where in the second half (entitled "The Country of the Saints") it is linked to the Mormons in Utah.

Most (if not all) was jettisoned, into a story about murder for insurance, centering around Anna May Wong and Alan Dinehart. Dinehart's character Thaddeus Merrydew, is based on a single line of writing in the four novels and fifty six short stories that were written by Conan Doyle. In "The Adventure of the Empty House", when reading a list of people with "M" in their name (he is searching for the biography of Colonel Sebastian Moran), he finds a reference to "Merrydew of abominable memory." That's it! No "Thaddeus Merrydew", just "Merrydew". Somebody concocting the script remembered that one reference. I may add, this was also the last time in movies there was any villain named Merrydew against Mr. Sherlock Holmes.

As an early talkie film about Holmes, it is worth seeing - but it is not among the best Holmes movies.

"A Study in Scarlet", somewhat more than loosely based on Conan Doyle's very first 'Sherlock Holmes' novel published in 1887, stars this time Reginald Owen, one of Hollywood's most famous British character actors who during his long career played about everything from Ebenezer Scrooge to King Louis XV. - and even Dr. Watson, in the previous Sherlock Holmes adventure with Clive Brook in the title role. It was the only time Owen portrayed the master sleuth - unfortunately, for he did QUITE well in this role!

Definitely less haughty and pedantic and more sympathetic than Basil Rathbone (who, nevertheless, was admittedly the most 'true' impersonator of Doyle's original character), yet just as clever and quick-witted, Owen alias Holmes is being asked for help by the widow of a member of an obscure 'organization' who's been tricked out of the money her husband would have soon been to receive from the shady 'business transactions' of that organization. At the same time, a strange newspaper ad, obviously written in a kind of code, intrigues Holmes - and it all finally leads him to one of his 'favorite' enemies, lawyer-blackmailer Merrydew...

A very nice, entertaining crime story, with much love for every detail and a perfectly recreated atmosphere of England in the 1880s, from the shady back streets of London to the quiet countryside, where Holmes (that is, Owen) delivers a hilarious impersonation of a wealthy elderly gentleman - just about like the disguises Chester Morris impressed us with many times as 'Boston Blackie'! Some genuinely English 'characters' complete the picture, a whole 'epidemic' of murders and murder attempts provides the adequate suspense... Not to be missed by fans of Sherlock Holmes in particular, and fans of classic crime in general!

I had never seen Reginald Owen in anything but a somewhat weak Christmas Carol. He plays a larger, more imposing Sherlock Holmes. Holmes' appearance is usually rather striking, so actors play on his idiosyncrasies. In this movie, he sort of blends in. The story has nothing to do with the story. It will probably never be produced as written because of it's religious issues. This is an attempt to apprehend the big cheese in a series of murders involving the "Scarlet Circle." Men are dying according to the same poem used in Christie's Ten Little Indians (And Then There Were None). Holmes is aware of what is going on, but can't really strike quickly. This results in deaths not being prevented. While there is a seriousness to this film, there is a lot of humor as well. The characters are rich and interesting and the acting is pretty good. See it for another angle on the Holmes canon.

As long as one understands this version of A STUDY IN SCARLET bears no resemblance to its source material, one can enjoy the performance of Reginald Owen -- best known for playing Scrooge -- as the inimitable Sherlock Holmes. The story as such involves a secret group of individuals who are being knocked off one at a time. A fortune is at stake! Holmes is called in and more or less immediately identifies the killer(s), but the movie stretches events out to feature length, and a bad movie it is not. Owen makes an acceptable Holmes, even though the story has been moved forward to the time in which the movie was made. Warburton Gamble's Dr. Watson leaves something to be desired, but most movie Watsons can be found lacking. Only Ian Fleming in 1935's TRIUMPH OF SHERLOCK HOLMES and the Dr. Watsons of the Jeremy Brett TV series come even close to the Watson of the Conan Doyle stories. Worth a look as a novelty.

"A Study in Scarlet" was produced by the low-budget E. W. Hammons at the low-budget Tiffany Studios starring a former Watson (possibly cast because of his association with Holmes films), Reginald Owen, as Sherlock Holmes. The presence of Holmes and Watson is the only connection to the Arthur Conan Doyle story of the same name, and that, in and of itself, is not a bad thing. I have no problem with a Sherlock Holmes film straying from slavish fidelity to the creator of the character. However, this one seems to deviate from the original not as a result of the filmmakers' creativity being exercised in order to make something new, but often in ways that make Holmes into someone that resembles a generic detective protagonist more than the most recognizable of them all.

It's a little odd to see a supposed Sherlock Holmes dart around wearing clothes clearly dated to the 1930s (the only appearance of the famous deerstalker is in cartoon form in the opening titles), but since the story doesn't depend on anything terribly time-period appropriate, the transposition to the contemporary setting doesn't have too much of an effect. A curiosity here is that we are repeated told that Sherlock Holmes lives at 221A Baker Street, not the traditional 221B, even though he still seems to be living upstairs. Whether that's a simple error on somebody's part or a nod to the liberties being taken with the original stories there is no way to tell.

Owen, unfortunately, is rather stiff and unremarkable in is portrayal of Sherlock Holmes. Many point out that he doesn't look the part (and, traditionally, he doesn't) but that hasn't been a problem for countless other actors. If he had managed to make the role his own through his performance it wouldn't have been for him either. He has little presence and seems to think that if he bellows each line with enough conviction and self-satisfaction he'll sound as if he knows what he's talking about.

Sadly the rest of the actors are rather wooden and unimpressive as well, including Anna May Wong. Warburton Gamble makes no impression as Watson, and some of the murder victims are laughably unconvincing in their hesitant screams for help at their dying moments. Everything is taken deadly seriously except for some overplayed comic relief involving characters at a pub, which only semi works.

There is a good mystery story at the heart of this film about a circle of criminals whose members are being murdered one-by-one, but the execution (including the direction which, the exception of one clever shot inside Merrydew's office near the end, mainly doesn't go beyond static two- an three-shots) is too lackluster to serve it well. The scriptwriter deserves credit for a good concept and for a good method of developing the story through showing us going on in all quarters without completely explaining its significance, but nobody else seems to have been trying very hard.

It's still entertaining most of the time, and fun for viewers who will eat up anything Holmesian, but it's far from the best executed film version of the detective's adventures.