Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon (1942)

Director:

Roy William Neill

Writers:

Edward T. Lowe Jr. (screenplay) &
Scott Darling (screenplay) ...
(more)

Release Date:

12 February 1943 (USA)

Genre:

Adventure | Crime | Drama | Mystery | Thriller

Plot:

Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson must protect a Swiss inventor of an advanced bomb sight from falling into German hands.

Plot Keywords:

Inventor | Sherlock Holmes | Switzerland | Bomb Sight | Bomb

Cast

Basil Rathbone	...	Sherlock Holmes
Nigel Bruce	...	Doctor John H. Watson
Lionel Atwill	...	Professor James Moriarty
Kaaren Verne	...	Charlotte Eberli
William Post Jr.	...	Dr. Franz Tobel
Dennis Hoey	...	Inspector Lestrade
Holmes Herbert	...	Sir Reginald Bailey
Mary Gordon	...	Mrs. Martha Hudson
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Rudolph Anders	...	Braun (uncredited)
Ted Billings	...	Barfly (uncredited)
Veda Ann Borg	...	Bar Singer (voice) (uncredited)
Paul Bryar	...	Swiss Waiter (uncredited)
John Burton	...	RAF Officer (uncredited)
Vicki Campbell	...	Woman RAF Pilot (uncredited)
Gerard Cavin	...	Scotland Yard Man (uncredited)
Harry Cording	...	Jack Brady (uncredited)
James Craven	...	RAF Officer Watching Bombsight Test (uncredited)
Harold De Becker	...	Peg Leg (uncredited)
Leslie Denison	...	Bobbie (uncredited)
George Eldredge	...	Policeman Outside Durer's (uncredited)
Paul Fix	...	Mueller (uncredited)
Leyland Hodgson	...	RAF Officer (uncredited)
Colin Kenny	...	Scotland Yard Detective (uncredited)
Guy Kingsford	...	Foot Patrolman (uncredited)
George Burr Macannan	...	Gottfried (uncredited)
Michael Mark	...	George (uncredited)
Henry Victor	...	Professor Frederic Hoffner (uncredited)
Harry Woods	...	Kurt (uncredited)

Directed by
Roy William Neill

Writing credits
Edward T. Lowe Jr.		(screenplay) (as Edward T. Lowe) &
Scott Darling		(screenplay) (as W. Scott Darling) &
Edmund L. Hartmann		(screenplay)
Arthur Conan Doyle		(story "The Dancing Men") (as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Scott Darling		(adaptation) (as W. Scott Darling) &
Edward T. Lowe Jr.		(adaptation) (as Edward T. Lowe)

Produced by
Howard Benedict	....	associate producer

Original Music by
Frank Skinner

Cinematography by
Lester White		(director of photography) (as Les White)

Film Editing by
Otto Ludwig

Art Direction by
Jack Otterson

Set Decoration by
Russell A. Gausman		(as R.A. Gausman)

Costume Design by
Vera West		(gowns)

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
William Tummel	....	assistant director (uncredited)

Art Department
Martin Obzina	....	associate art director
Edward R. Robinson	....	associate set decorator

Sound Department
Bernard B. Brown	....	sound director
Paul Neal	....	sound technician

Music Department
Charles Previn	....	musical director
Richard Hageman	....	composer: stock music (uncredited)
Hans J. Salter	....	composer: stock music (uncredited)

Other crew
Tom McKnight	....	technical advisor

Production Companies

• Universal Pictures

Distributors

• Universal Pictures (1942) (USA) (theatrical)
• Realart Pictures Inc. (1948) (USA) (theatrical) (re-release)
• Fox Video (1993) (USA) (VHS)
• Take 2 Video (1995) (USA) (VHS)
• Madacy Entertainment (1998) (USA) (VHS)
• Take 2 Video (1998) (USA) (VHS)
• FOCUSfilm Entertainment (2001) (USA) (DVD)
• Gotham Distribution (2002) (USA) (DVD)
• Lions Gate Films Home Entertainment (2002) (USA) (VHS)
• Navarre Entertainment (2002) (USA) (DVD)
• MPI Home Video (2003) (USA) (DVD)
• MPI Home Video (2003) (USA) (VHS)
• Alpha Video Distributors (2004) (USA) (DVD)
• BFS Video (2004) (USA) (DVD)
• National Film Museum (2004) (USA) (TV) (as National Film Museum Incorporated)
• Reel Media International (2004) (worldwide) (VHS)
• 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment (2005) (USA) (DVD)
• Hollywood's Best (2005) (USA) (DVD)
• Hollywood's Best (2005) (USA) (VHS)
• MPI Home Video (2006) (USA) (DVD)
• Hal Roach Studios (1986) (worldwide) (all media) (Colorized version)
• Legend Films (2005) (worldwide) (DVD)
• RCV Home Entertainment (2007) (Netherlands) (DVD)
• Reel Media International (2007) (worldwide) (all media)
• St. Clair Entertainment Group (2008) (USA) (DVD)
• Top Tape (????) (Brazil) (VHS)
• Video Cellar, The (2006) (Australia) (all media)
• Video Treasures (????) (USA) (VHS)

Other Companies

• Screen Time Images  audio restoration
• Screen Time Images  film restoration

Also Known As:

"Secret Weapon" - USA (short title)

Runtime:

UK:80 min | USA:68 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | French | Indonesian

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Certification:

Sweden:15 | UK:PG (video rating) (1990) | UK:U (original rating) (cut) | USA:Approved (PCA #8660) | Australia:PG

Filming Locations:

Universal Studios - 100 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, California, USA

Company:

Universal Pictures

Trivia:

The fourth of fourteen films based on Arthur Conan Doyle's fictional consulting detective Sherlock Holmes starring Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes and Nigel Bruce as Doctor Watson.

Goofs:

Continuity: In the shots of Dr. Tobel peering through his bombsight, the bomb-release switch is clearly shown as being a black Bakelite line-cord rocker switch, mounted inline on the bombsight's electrical trip-wire. Yet in the last bomb-drop shot, Dr. Tobel uses a large round push-button switch to release the bomb, and it appears to be mounted on the end of a trip-wire, not inline on the wire.

Quotes:

Professor Moriarty:[as Moriarty drains Holmes's blood] Drop by drop, Holmes. Drop by drop. Eh, in a way I'm almost sorry. You were a stimulating influence to me. But it was obvious that I should win in the end... Closer to the end Holmes. Closer and closer. Each second a few more drops leave your desiccated body. And you can feel them can't you? You're perfectly conscious, aren't you, Holmes?
Sherlock Holmes:I shall be conscious long after you're dead, Moriarty.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in The Great Mouse Detective (1986)

Soundtrack:

Sobre las Olas (Over the Waves)

Middling effort.

The first two Rathbone/Bruce movies were pretty good. Not just because they were in period but because their production values were good and because some effort went into the script. Only the first, "The Hound of the Baskervilles", was based on a Conan-Doyle novella. The second was a pastiche made famous on the stage by Gillette.

Then the franchise was moved to Universal Studios and a series of mostly declining quality was established. This was an early example. It's not terrible, not embarrassingly bad, it just loses something in being updated to the 1940s and in not having the atmosphere Conan-Doyle managed to inject into his characters and into the atmosphere itself. Not to mention some of Conan-Doyle's sometimes unwittingly delicious bon mots -- "The wind sobbed like a child in the chimney."

"The Secret Weapon" doesn't tell us much we don't already know about Holmes and Watson. There is a variation on Conan-Doyle's "Dancing Men" but not really much else that's too interesting. I never cared much for Lionel Atwill as an actor, and he looks especially clunky as Moriarty. Moriarty should be a reptilian ectomorph with an oscillating head.

Still, this is okay for fans of the series. Homes wears his hair combed from back to front on the sides, which is a little different. I wish the code had allowed him to do some cocaine once in a while. The best of the Universal films was unquestionably "The Scarlet Claw," so if you have to choose, choose that one to watch.