Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Sherlock Holmes, Grenada Series

From:  YouTube

Light on plot, heavy on melodrama and bordering on farce, I love these old 1980's episodes.

Scandal in Bohemia

The King of Bohemia hires Holmes to get an incriminating
photograph from Irene Adler, the only woman to ever outwit Holmes.  Holmes secretly falls in love with

The Dancing Men

One of the best of Sherlock Holmes. It shows the deductive power of a detective to break a secret code with very little information.

The Naval Treaty

Sherlock Holmes takes an interest in the case of a British Foreign Office employee who has had an important naval treaty stolen from his office.

The Solitary Cyclist

A beautiful woman bicycles down a lonely road, not knowing of the vile plots being launched against her. Has she talked to Holmes in time? A young music teacher terrorized by the mysterious figure who follows her as she bicycles appeals to Holmes, who is very nearly too late to save her from a monster. A truly snort worthy bout of fisticuffs in village pub between Holmes and the villian.

The Crooked Man

The Speckled Band

The Blue Carbuncle

The Second Stain

finds Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's famous sleuth facing intertwining problems, each with very different consequences. On the one hand, a saber-rattling letter to the British government from a "foreign potentate" has disappeared from the hands of the Rt. Honorable Trelawney Hope (Stuart Wilson), which could incite a major war if it turns up in some visible way. On the other hand, Hope's wife, Lady Hilda (Patricia Hodge), appears to know something about the letter's disposition, but she won't say on pain of some undefined disaster to her marriage. Holmes (Jeremy Brett in his finest hour) and Dr. Watson (a wonderful performance by Edward Hardwicke) can't unravel one mystery without tackling the other, and then there is a murder to boot. The results are well worth the story complications that ensue. The look of epiphany on Brett's face when the ever-clueless Inspector Lestrade (Colin Jeavons) tells Holmes about an odd detail in the murder victim's home--the placement of a certain bloodstained rug doesn't correspond to the location of the soaked-through stain on the floor below--is enormous fun.

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