The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970) 125m
You can't see Billy Wilder's sly, colourful, and witty Sherlock Holmes film in its original 200-minute cut because United Artists, fearing that long epics were becoming passe with audiences, had it trimmed prior to release. Fortunately the film's episodic structure allowed it to be shortened without harming the story significantly. Although never properly restored, bonus footage was released on laser disc decades later, which can be assembled into a near-complete version for home viewers. In the film's beyond-the-grave prologue Dr Watson informs us that he is going to reveal stories about his friend Holmes that were never published during their lifetimes. If you didn't know about the earlier, longer cut of the film you might find this introduction puzzling, as there appears to be only one story in the film, preceded by an anecdote about a visit to the ballet. In fact the film was made up of three short cases (The Upside-Down Room, The Russian Ballerina, The Naked Honeymooners) followed by a feature-length mystery (The Dumbfounded Detective). Of these stories, only numbers two and four remain in the released print. Watson states that the reason he had never made any of these cases public was because of their delicate nature, but a more likely reason is that all stories show a failure on the parts of both Watson and Holmes to solve a legitimate criminal case: the first is a tricky red herring; the second is a deception; the third is misdirection. Only in the final story does Holmes get to flex his muscles, when the game is well and truly afoot.
Wilder and co-writer I.A.L. Diamond construct a delicious game for this final chapter -- the story keeps accumulating disparate and baffling developments in a way that Conan Doyle would have been proud of. Robert Stephens and Colin Blakely shine as the crime-solving heroes -- Blakely cheerfully occupies the template established by Nigel Bruce's Watson in the classic film series, and Stephens is dry and haughty as Holmes, yet also complex and troubled. Their dialogue, especially in their first scene together, shows that Wilder has still not lost his touch after thirty years in the film business. What I find admirable about THE PRIVATE LIFE OF SHERLOCK HOLMES is that despite its mischievous tone the film is full of good will and respect for Conan Doyle's characters and stories. It's Wilder's most elegant and good-looking picture, employing a score by Miklos Rosza and shot on location in glorious widescreen. Wilder also hasn't lost his sense of wicked humour -- the Russian Ballerina sequence is hilarious, capitalizing on the sort of revisionism that classic characters and stories often get subjected to by modern critics. The Honeymoon story is also amusing on two levels, as it simultaneously milks a farcical gag for all its worth (mistaken intentions feature predominately in this film) while deconstructing the whole process of Holmes' deductive reasoning. The original unreleased opening segment introduces a regular from the Holmes stories, Inspector Lestrade, to comic effect, but ends on a more serious note, with Holmes firing a pistol at his cocaine vials. It's a mini-conclusion which foreshadows the film's final moments, suggesting that Holmes' interest in solving crimes is not an escape from boredom, as he claims, but an escape from his inner torment. It's an unusual ending for such a light-hearted film, but don't hold that against it. If the opportunity ever arises to see this in a cinema with an audience, take it.
sburridge@hotmail.com
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