THE SIGN OF THE FOUR (1983) ** Fair to middlin' Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock figures it out very quickly-but without being particularly impressive-so a lot of it is just Sherlock following around a dog. It's a great dog, big ol' bloodhound with flappy ears...I wish it would have found something to bay about, though. It looks good (film, but dog too), moves along nicely, no complaints really. Even when it's trying to find something to do-the pathetic carnival mirrors "novelty" scene jumps to mind-it's more unintentionally amusing than annoying. Scotland Yard is portrayed as humorously incompetent as always, but Sherlock just stands there with plenty of clues looking him in the face, too. One might (wrongly, probably) deduce that Arthur Conan Doyle (who they at least don't blame in the credits) knew very little about crime investigation procedures, or found that they got in the way of what he considered at least a working plot. Who cares about all that, much...Ian Richardson and David Healey are pleasant as Sherlock and Whatsit, and when Healey starts trying not to make particularly google eyes at the female present it makes up for whatever shortcomings you might allow yourself to notice. It's a Holmes more enjoyable by not noticing, then.
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