Dressed to Kill [Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Code] **** (1946, Basil Rathbone, Nigel Bruce, Patricia Morison, Edmond Breon, Carl Harbord) – Classic Movie Review 985

All good things must come to an end, but the 1946 mystery film Dressed to Kill finds Basil Rathbone’s Sherlock Holmes and Nigel Bruce’s Dr Watson going out in style in the last of their 14 Conan Doyle films together.

‘Queen… of a Crime Cult!’

Director William Neill’s 1946 mystery film Dressed to Kill [Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Code] finds Basil Rathbone’s Sherlock Holmes and Nigel Bruce’s Dr Watson going out in style in their 12th and final Holmes Universal Pictures series B-movie and the last of their 14 films together as the beloved Conan Doyle characters.

The two 20th Century Fox Victorian-set features The Hound of the Baskervilles (1939) and The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1939) preceded the Universal Pictures’ modern-day series.

In screenwriter Leonard Lee’s new story, supposedly adapted from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s short story The Adventure of the Six Napoleons, they link three Dartmoor Prison convict-built music boxes to engraved templates for banknotes nabbed from the Bank of England. Now Rathbone’s Holmes must find charwoman villainess Mrs Hilda Courtney (Patricia Morison) and her music box.

Holmes is apparently infallible. He has this in mind: ‘Elementary, my dear fellow, one of the first principles in solving crime is never to disregard anything no matter how trivial.’ So obviously, he does find Hilda, and, when he does, they stakes are higher, and she tells him: ‘It’s so fearfully awkward, having a dead body lying about. Don’t you agree Mr Holmes?’

Well-paced and neatly plotted, this mystery thriller B-movie must-see brings things to a sleek and satisfying conclusion. Rathbone and Bruce are as impeccable and definitive as ever. But it is a bitter-sweet occasion. It is sad to bid farewell to them.

To everybody else’s enormous disappointment, Rathbone decided he was getting typecast and must end the series and move on. He got fed up with Holmes just like the creator Sir Arthur Conan Doyle did. However, Conan Doyle was eventually forced to bring Holmes back, while Rathbone did not return.

Watson mentions two original Conan Doyle stories, A Scandal in Bohemia (the first story in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes collection) and The Solitary Cyclist. The ploy of using a bogus fire to reveal the location of a hidden item is taken from A Scandal in Bohemia and connections are made between Mrs Courtney and that story’s villainess, Irene Adler.

Also in the cast are Edmond [Edmund] Breon, Carl Harbord (Inspector Hopkins), Patricia Cameron, Holmes Herbert, Tom Dillon, Frederic [Frederick] Worlock, Harry Cording, Mary Gordon (Mrs Hudson), Ian Wolfe (Commissioner of Scotland Yard), Anita Sharp-Bolster, Leyland Hodgson and Lillian Bronson.

Dressed to Kill is also known as Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Code, its title in the UK, and no doubt sometimes on TV to avoid confusion with the 1941 crime mystery film Dressed to Kill starring Lloyd Nolan as Michael Shayne. Its working title was Prelude to Murder but it nicked the better 1941 title.

Brian De Palma used the title again for his 1980 American erotic psychological thriller film Dressed to Kill. Much earlier, there was a 1928 silent film Dressed to Kill starring Mary Astor and Edmund Lowe.

It is one of four films in the Universal Holmes series in the public domain, free to view online. It is available for free viewing and download at the Internet Archive.

RIP stage and screen legend Patricia Morison.

And so it is Patricia Morison who has the distinction of being the last villain encountered by Basil Rathbone’s Sherlock Holmes in the classic Universal series.

RIP stage and screen legend Patricia Morison, who died at 103 on 20 May 2018. She made her film debut in 1939 and is best known for the 1943 spy film noir The Fallen Sparrow, Dressed to Kill, The Song of Bernadette. and the 1960 Franz Liszt biopic Song Without End.

Dressed to Kill (aka Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Code, directed by Roy William Neill, runs 76 minutes (copyright length) 72 minutes (restored version), is made and released by Universal Pictures, is written by Leonard Lee and Frank Gruber, is shot by Maury Gertsman, is produced by Roy William Neill, is scored by Milton Rosen, and is designed by Jack Otterson.

The cast are Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes, Nigel Bruce as Dr John H Watson,  Patricia Morison as charwoman Mrs Hilda Courtney, Edmund Breon as Julian ‘Stinky’ Emery, Frederick Worlock as Colonel Cavanaugh, Carl Harbord as Inspector Hopkins, Patricia Cameron as Evelyn Clifford, Holmes Herbert as Ebenezer Crabtree, Harry Cording as Hamid, Leyland Hodgson as Tour Guide, Mary Gordon as Mrs. Hudson, Ian Wolfe as Commissioner of Police, Anita Sharp-Bolster as Museum Tour Schoolteacher, Cyril Delavanti as John Davidson, Harry Allen as William Kilgour, and Topsy Glyn as The Kilgour Child.

The films of Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes and Nigel Bruce as Doctor Watson: The Hound of the Baskervilles (1939), The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1939), Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror (1942), Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon (1942), Sherlock Holmes in Washington (1943), Sherlock Holmes Faces Death (1943), The Spider Woman (1943), The Scarlet Claw (1944), The Pearl of Death (1944), The House of Fear (1945), The Woman in Green (1945), Pursuit to Algiers (1945), Terror by Night (1946), and Dressed to Kill (1946).

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 985 derekwinnert.com