By Robin Rowles
The annual Film Night is a fixture where members of the Society can enjoy rare films and television adaptations of Sherlock Holmes stories. It’s part of the Society’s Autumn Season, the other notable event being the Richard Lancelyn Green Memorial Lecture in October.
This year’s film night took place on 13 November at the Cinema Museum in Kennington, South London. The Cinema Museum is a glorious treasure-chest of film equipment, cameras, film posters, and memorabilia. Even a table where used DVD, Blu-Ray and of course, books about the history of film may be purchased; all profits go back to supporting the museum. The museum includes a small cinema and bar, and the seating is traditional ‘flip-up’ seating. See the link below for more details about the museum. Before the films, a party of guests enjoyed a light dinner arranged by the Society at the Toulouse Lautrec Restaurant nearby. Thanks to the Society for organising this.
The evening was introduced by Society stalwart Catherine Cooke and presented by the Society’s film buff Matthew J. Elliott. Thanks to Matthew for kindly sharing his notes.
Matthew began by thanking another Society expert, Roger Johnson, who hosted the film night in 2024. Matthew then whetted our appetites for Sherlockian drama with news of several Sherlockian film projects in the pipeline: a second season of Watson, an intriguing project called Mademoiselle Holmes in France, Guy Richie’s Young Sherlock, and an Indian version of Hound of the Baskervilles just around the corner.
The first offering was from an episode of Shekar Home (BBC India, 2024) and was a retelling of A Study in Scarlet called ‘It’s Elementary’ reframed in an Indian setting. Kay Kay Menon plays the great detective, and Ranvir Shorey plays the Indian ‘Watson’ character. Similarly to Benedict Cumberbatch’s Sherlock (BBC, 2010), Shekar Home places the outline of A Study in Scarlet into a near-contemporary setting. Although there are obvious similarities to Sherlock, these aren’t intrusive and this doesn’t feel like a carbon copy of the BBC show as there are elements that give it a unique twist. The show’s dialogue is in Indian, but adequately subtitled. Matthew notes the story is narrated briskly, but enjoyably, and I’m looking forward to seeing future episodes. Making allowances that this is the first episode, and effectively a pilot, intended to sell the series, this is a remarkable production.
The second half of the evening was a feature-length adaptation of the Musgrave Ritual from the 2013 Russian Sherlock Holmes series, starring Igor Petrenko and Andrei Panin as Holmes and Watson. Unusually for this series, in this episode, there is no overarching plot involving Moriarty and Irene Adler. This allows the creators time to expand upon aspects of the plot. However, this isn’t padding, it helps develop the story and adds a little suspense. Being a Russian production, the dialogue is in Russian with subtitles. Matthew notes that in previous editions of this series the subtitles were somewhat eccentric. However, he was able to link the soundtrack with an improved set of subtitles. This reviewer hasn’t seen the entire series. However, based on this episode, viewers wishing to watch the full season of eight episodes are recommended to take their time. The pacing is like a slow burning fuse, but blink and you’ll miss vital clues.
This was a successful and enjoyable evening, in an excellent venue which this reviewer is keen to revisit.
La gazette du 221 B 