The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970)

Directed by: Billy Wilder | 125 minutes | adventure, comedy | Actors: Robert Stephens, Colin Blakely, Geneviève Page, Christopher Lee, Tamara Toumanova, Clive Revill, Irene Handl, Mollie Maureen, Peter Madden

More movies have been made about him than any other fictional character: Sherlock Holmes. Billy Wilder also ventured into it. In fact; he had grand plans for the creation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. It would become his most prestigious and most expensive production ever. However, it all turned out differently. All scenes from the 260-page script were filmed, but several scenes were cut in the post-production phase at the behest of producer United Artists. A flashback to Holmes’s college years—indicating his distrust of women—was cut from the film, as was a segment in which the detective investigates a virtually unsolvable case in a room that literally hangs upside down. There are more scenes that didn’t make the final cut of ‘The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes’ (1970). United Artists was not in good shape at the end of the sixties and for fear of even more face and financial loss, they decided to shorten the film to ‘normal’ proportions. The three and a half hours that Wilder had in mind for his epic was shortened to 125 minutes. Because the director had built his film up from a number of episodes, it was easy to delete a few here and there. It is hoped for fans that the chapter ‘The Dreadful Business of the Naked Honeymooners’, like ‘The Curious Case of the Upside Down Room’, will one day be found and restored.

So what do we have? ‘The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes’ consists of one short and one long adventure of Holmes (played by theater actor Robert Stephens; Wilder deliberately chose not to use famous names) and his faithful companion Dr. Watson (Colin Blakely). In the first story, Holmes is approached by Russian prima ballerina Madame Petrova (Tamara Toumanova), who desperately wants a child and sees the perfect candidate in the razor-sharp and bold Holmes. However, the detective doesn’t want to think about it and pretends that there is more than just friendship between him and Watson. And that while Watson is just putting the flowers out with a group of voluptuous dancers. He doesn’t have very long to worry about reputational damage, because the next case is just around the corner. Literally in this case, because the confused Gabrielle (Geraldine Page) fished out of the Thames is delivered to Baker Street. She begs Holmes to find her missing husband, an engineer. It turns out that Sherlock’s brother Mycroft (Christopher Lee) has been recruited for a special, secret assignment. To find out exactly what the fork is, Holmes, Watson and Gabrielle must travel to the Scottish Highlands, where they come face to face with dwarves, evil monks, Queen Victoria and the Loch Ness Monster.

Billy Wilder is the man of sharp, cynical humor and that is certainly present in ‘The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes’. Especially the first segment, which only lasts about twenty minutes, is very witty. Because of the creative ways Sherlock tries to get out of the Russian ballerina’s advances, but also because of the delicious bickering between the detective and his landlady Mrs. Hudson (Irene Handle). Robert Stephens, with his quintessentially British appearance and striking observations, is a joy to watch. Colin Blakely is more of the ‘paljas’ type, but doesn’t do this without merit. It’s a whole new way to portray the illustrious character of Watson. After the first chapter, Wilder curiously trades the humor for a more straightforward mystery. With a title that promises us to learn more about Holmes’ private life, the revelations are a bit sparse. Except for a few hints that he may be a man’s love (which is later contradicted again) and a glimpse of his cocaine addiction (which apparently only arises when boredom sets in with the star detective), ‘The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes’ is pretty good. and that’s not typical Wilder. There is a real chance that the film as Wilder once intended it, including the deleted scenes, would have fitted more in the expectations we have of the master director’s work. If so, United Artists’ meddling probably killed the film. In any case, Wilder himself was not at all happy with the way his work had been trimmed.

A lesser film by Wilder is still worth watching. The aforementioned first twenty minutes alone should be seen by every Wilder fan. The dialogues are fine as always; maybe not as sharp as we’re used to from Wilder, but well worth the effort. It’s a shame that the film is so unbalanced and that in the part that follows more the path of the traditional mystery, there are (too many) moments that drag. On the other hand, the good performances by Stephens and Lee in particular, an atmospheric setting, beautiful music by the legendary composer Miklós Rósza and a nine meters long fake Loch Ness monster that had sunk to the bottom during the recording in 1969 and only surfaced again in 2016. water was fetched.