User Reviews

Holmes and Watson are called out to the damp, chilly moors to investigate the disappearance of a young boy from the Priory School. He seems to have been kidnapped by a German instructor, Mr. Heidegger. Both left the Priory School without explanation at the same time. The important thing is that the kid is Lord Arthur Saltire, son of the Duke of Holderness, an arid and frosty man who wants to avoid any scandal.

Holmes examines the scene and immediately deduces that Heidegger did not in fact kidnap the kid but rather accidentally saw him running away from the premises and pursued him on bicycle. Holmes unravels the case, which involves kidnapping, bastardy, jealousy, murder, and a terrible meal.

It's one of the more interesting stories in the canon, both in print and on film. I don't want to spell out too much of the plot because the revelation isn't self evident as it sometimes is.

The Duke -- fellas and gals, that's pronounced "Dyuke" and he is addressed as "Your Grace." Try to remember that, will you? The Duke gives the best performance, aside from the dynamic duo themselves. At first his expression, his whole demeanor, seems to be one of unshakable grandeur but later, without really altering his delivery very much, he reveals that it's really a terrible sadness. Exquisitely nuanced performance by Alan Howard as the Duke.

But I don't understand why the writer and director didn't make more of one of the essential clues, in a glass case in the foyer, which Holmes happens upon. And what, was the author prescient or something? A German professor named Heidegger? Out of all the possible German names he picks Heidegger, a famous philosopher? He could at least have shot for Hediger, a zoologist who was less well known and also not born yet. Or, if he'd really wanted to go for the surreal, he could have used Friedegger. But never mind.

It's a good story and has one of those jokes about the awful food that Watson must consume. The innkeeper's wife reels off the contents and it sounds like the witches' cauldron in MacBeth. "How is it, Watson?" "Holmes, It's disgusting."

It is immediately noticeable that Jeremy Brett bets all his role on an allurement to be taken or left:he moves exclusively as in a dream.In some episodes,and with certain viewers,these work;in/with others, not.In The Priory School there are a couple of moments when Brett's unfitness works in the right direction.First,when Holmes refuses to leave the school and declares he will continue his investigation.This makes the most obvious the intellectual and urban nature of Brett's charm.His Holmes is sometimes endearing because of Brett's helplessness beyond the husk:that of an inoffensive,urban, intellectual and,in the long run, ingenuous person.This man looks,and is,very helpless all along the line, unsubstantial,languid, irreclaimable, dreamy,likely addict and very truthful and trustworthy;also Unsexed.That is perhaps why Holmes' disguises are so unsuited.One sees that Brett progressed in shaping an interesting and personal understanding of Holmes.When Holmes loiters away his time,or lops about,or has the laugh of Eric Porter 's gang,or lolls,or looks daggers at Watson,there is a perceptible unifying center in these behaviors.Holmes' smile is Hyaline;so is his childishness.There is a compact authenticity in Brett's play.His charm is touching,and not even his grandiloquence can spoil that.

The Priory School is a good episode,suspenseful enough.

Objectively speaking,I think we see too many rags,tats,the ragged tatterdemalion,his tattered raggedness,his ugly tatters in The Man with the Twisted Lip;but even this is surpassed by the most annoying couple in this series:Mr. and Mrs. St. Clair (Clive Francis and Eleanor David).Though,mostly her (Eleanor David).She is,I believe,the most annoying actress in the whole series.On the other hand,St. Clair's vice of beggary is made to look quite laughable and beetling.The idea has something monstrous,as the strangest form of addiction.Homes' disguises are,as ever,stupid.As I have already said,the entire poetry of the tatters,the unwashed and ragamuffins is completely disgusting,a cheap device of social exoticism,if I may call it that.

Almost like Agatha Christie's Poirot, The Return of Sherlock Holmes is better when and whether it consents to be B.In The Man with the Twisted Lip,the moment when Holmes finally understands the beggars' stratagem is a fine one.And throughout this episode,Holmes is less fractious,and even his moves are less fragmentary (in the geological sense).