Expected more

It's not great by any means, but it's a pretty good movie that didn't leave me filled with regret for investing time in it.

It is not only a funny movie, but it allows a great amount of joy for anyone who watches it.

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

I read a few of the reviews here before watching this for the first time. I adore Jeremy Brett as Sherlock Holmes, and all of the adaptations this company made of the original stories by Conan Doyle. I saw "The Last Vampyre" (not from Conan Doyle) and thought it stupid and silly. So I was prepared to dislike this one, also a late entry in the series.It takes some getting used to. There are odd interpolated scenes that don't seem to make any sense. There are foreshadowings and flashbacks. There are a lot of extreme closeups. There are also brilliantly constructed scenes with impressive lighting effects. It's very non-linear and often puzzling.The overall effect? I'm impressed. All the strange scenes make sense at the end, even granting, upon rational reflection, that the ending is perhaps a bit unlikely. This is a superbly crafted, acted, and presented film. It is a worthy addition to the Canon, and a triumph by Brett and Edward Hardwicke. By all means, give it a shot. Don't be dissuaded by the negative reviews. This is truly a great Sherlock Holmes mystery.henry

One of the things that supposedly led Jeremy Brett to take on the mantle of Holmes was the fact that Granada wanted to do something that no other film or television producer had done before, namely, do the Doyle stories as they were written. And for the most part, they did. It seems that towards the end of Brett's life, when he was at his weakest, they gave him the weirdest, melodramatic and nonsensical adaptations to showcase his talents. Even if I didn't know the story The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor, "The Eligible Bachelor" would've had me confused, since it is just all over the place. We start out with the upcoming nuptials of Hattie Doran and Lord Robert St. Simon (along the lines of the original story). Then we veer into a very strange subplot with Sherlock Holmes being unable to sleep because he's having a recurring nightmare (which he sketches). Throw in an old estate with jungle animals, a maimed veiled lady (possibly borrowed from The Adventure of the Veiled Lodger)a murderous husband, a wife driven mad and all other sorts of wackiness that not only was never in the original story, but which just makes the whole piece unwieldy and a mess. I've appreciated other episodes where the writers were able to dramatize some elements of "backstory" but in this case, they just added in all sorts of things that made for an over-the-top piece of melodrama that probably has Conan Doyle spinning.

Of the three feature length adaptations Granda made of Conan-Doyle's novels (rather than the usual 50 min ones) this was the one that veered the most from the original tale. The original idea of mistaken identity is turned into a surreal gothic horror, with the hero of the original story now a serial murderer and bigamist. Holmes is also turned into a detective with a more tortured soul and what appears to be second sight. The story, however, benefits from this as the original short story was a little bland and boring. Brett rises to the challenge and gives one of his best ever performances, and Simon Callow is suitably suarve and evil as the main protagonist. Generally, a sumptious adaptation, given a 90's polish and reworking!

This dramatization of a short story is stretched past breaking point. Far, far, far too much padding takes place before the story gets started. Even when it does, every scene is dragged out to painful length with no explanatory dialogue so as to make it impossible to comprehend nor actually care for any of the characters. Only Jeremy Brett's usual excellence as Holmes makes this awful mess even slightly worth watching.