Now Over 5500 Reviews and (near) Daily Updates!

WELCOME! Use the search engines on this site (or your own off-site engine of choice) to gain easy access to the complete MAKSQUIBS Archive; more than 5500 posts and counting. (New posts added every day or so.)

You can check on all our titles by typing the Title, Director, Actor or 'Keyword' you're looking for in the Search Engine of your choice (include the phrase MAKSQUIBS) or just use the BLOGSPOT.com Search Box at the top left corner of the page.

Feel free to place comments directly on any of the film posts and to test your film knowledge with the CONTESTS scattered here & there. (Hey! No Googling allowed. They're pretty easy.)

Send E-mails to MAKSQUIBS@yahoo.com . (Let us know if the TRANSLATE WIDGET works!) Or use the Profile Page or Comments link for contact.

Thanks for stopping by.

Thursday, August 29, 2013

DRESSED TO KILL (1946)

The last entry in Universal’s modern-day SHERLOCK HOLMES adventures marks a modest return to form after the halfhearted TERROR BY NIGHT/’46. This is the one with a secret code hidden (somehow, somewhere) inside three music boxes; a puzzle so tricky it takes a couple of unintentional clues from Nigel Bruce’s Dr. Watson to jog Basil Rathbone’s Holmes into action.* There’s a bit of physical derring-do for the great man; an actual ‘follow-that-taxi’ moment; and a couple of effective stand-offs with Patricia Morrison’s smooth, stylish villain. If only helmer Roy William Neill had also found a bit of style (and atmosphere) for the first half of the film. Will this turn out to be the first ever fog-free HOLMES? Fortunately, things perk up once Holmes goes down to a London dive for some musical advice from an old, disreputable client. And the film maintains a proper course from then on. Did they know the series was ending? If they’d only thought to have tossed in some philosophical musings for Sherlock at the end, this would have made for a dandy (and graceful) exit.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: *Baby-Boomers will note how much Watson’s unknowingly helpful comments to Holmes are like Manfred the Mighty Wonder Dog was to Tom Terrific.

No comments: