Reflections of a stormy petrel

The Rathbone movies were very variable in quality - some were awful - and Rathbone's partner Nigle Bruce is the father of all the bad Dr.Watson interpretation - woozy, comically stupid, and ineffective. (One has to remember that Dr.Watson is describing himself in the stories, and that he has the good taste to play himself down and smile at himself; but the stories still manage to make it clear that he is an effective, hard-working partner and occasionally a serious help in danger, with his service revolver at the ready.) But, like all forties Hollywood black-and-white products, they are gorgeous to look up - brother, they knew what to do with a camera in those days! - and Rathbone himself is a continuously superb Holmes. I havent's een Woodward, but I imagine he would be good. Cushing was nicely cerebral, but too withered - one has to remember that Holmes was a man of action who could stand up to prizefighters and resist the attentions of three professional thugs at once, and who, in The Speckled Band, straightened back the poker that Dr.Grimesby Roylott had bent (and straightening an already-bent piece of metal can actually be harder than to bend it). Rathbone, on the other hand, was the man who looked credible - and menacing - duelling with Erroll Flynn.