The Seven-Per-Cent Solution

I was not really impressed with this take on Holmes, the story feels vaguely wooden and mostly unimpressive. It has a couple spots here and there that are pretty worthy of the character, but it's lacking in writing and just not as engaging as it should have been. Plus, that whole bit with the horses running in a line trying to kill Holmes, he comments on their intelligence and then tricks them into running into a fence that anyone clearly could have climbed, that's a big eye roller.

The plot is pretty good but the production values are like from a british tv movie.

The story itself is entertaining, but the leads are miscast and the film is slackly directed.

Surprisingly good. Really dull for the first half hour or so, but bear with it for it picks up with a vengeance

Duvall is a smash as Watson, but the crappy sound on TCM's print makes it impossible to understand Nicol Williamson's staccato or Alan Arkin's lazy accent. Everyone seems to be having fun playing around with 70s obsessions (addiction and psychotherapy) within the Shelock Holmes playground, and more power to them, but it could have been tighter. Surprising swashbuckling component.

Sherlock Holmes (Nicol Williamson), addicted to cocaine and ranting about Moriarty (Laurence Olivier), is tricked by Watson (Robert Duvall) into visiting Vienna, where he comes under the care of Sigmund Freud (Alan Arkin). Clearly an all-star enterprise, and a pretty entertaining one at that thanks to Nicholas Meyer's witty script, but too much of the cast have too little to do and the mystery at the core of it seems rather perfunctory. A handsome production helps somewhat.