newmoonstar | (no subject)

Okay, I've finally given in to total Christie-fication, because I now like Miss Marple. I watched the conclusion of Miss Marple: The Murder at the Vicarage Monday night, because I had to miss it Sunday because of the Sherlock Holmes double feature on TCM. I was never into Miss Marple before because I thought the old series was dreadfully boring, but now I'm hooked! This new series is really well done, and I just love it. *eagerly awaits next episode*

And speaking of the Sherlock Holmes double feature, it was The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes and The Seven-Per-Cent-Solution. I'd seen Private Life a few years ago, but I didn't really remember very much of it, and it was before I'd read any of the Canon anyway, so I wanted to see it with fresh eyes, and the other I'd read the book but hadn't seen the movie, so I watched them both. I remember thinking Private Life was stupid the first time around, but since then I've read a lot about it, and I actually don't hate it as much as I thought I would. In fact, in it's own way, I really like it.

I think this film really captures the feeling of the fandom of Sherlock Holmes more than anything; it's obviously not meant to be a straight interpretation as much as a sort of love letter to it. It has a little fun with and make jokes about the well-loved conventions, the way fans do, but it switches between that and this really deep melancholy sadness that lurks behind it, this sort of sentimental nostalgia we all get for these characters and their lives. All the fun of it is, after all, founded on how attached we get to Holmes and Watson and their relationship.

Which, unfortunately, is the one aspect where the film really fails the worst; Colin Blakely is SUCH a terrible Watson. He's so fussy and hysterical and priggish, you wonder how Holmes could ever stand a guy like that (of course, Robert Stephens isn't a terribly canonical Holmes, but still). The thing is, Blakely doesn't show much real emotion, and he and Stephens don't have much chemistry, which is weird, because it was Stephens who wanted Blakely for the role because they'd worked together so often and were such good friends! Maybe it's Billy Wilder's fault, but everywhere else he gets it surprisingly right. It's a very old fashioned, sweet movie, more in the vein of The Time Machine or even Chitty Chitty Bang Bang than anything else. The whole movie is beautifully shot, the sets and costumes are first rate, and the score is absolutely beautiful. In fact the score is the best thing about the film; I wish it had a soundtrack, because I need that score like I need oxygen, it's THAT good! I should have taped it, just so I could listen to and swoon over the score again! *swoons just thinking about it*

But anyway, overall, I like the film; I would still rather they'd made a real adaptation of one of the stories, because with this quality of production it could have been a classic, but for the Holmes fan who's well grounded in the stories and the characters and the fandom, it's an interesting side trip. And I really would be interested to see how different the film would have been with that extra hour of material restored to it, because everybody involved in the film seems to think it was butchered and turned out terribly. If I like it even now, how good might it have been then? I hope that footage still exists somewhere, although they haven't found it in all this time, so it doesn't look hopeful... it looks like a case where we need Sherlock Holmes!

As for Seven-Per-Cent Solution, eh, it's the book on film, okay, nothing to shout about.