The Sherlock Holmes Vault Collection consists of four restored Sherlock Holmes films from the 1930s. Three of the films star Arthur Wontner and one stars Reginald Owen. The Film Detective put the set out and each film is on it's own Blu-ray with a commentary, an essay in a booklet, a small postcard of the film's poster, and a series of short bits and pieces.
The Wontner films are much better looking than the Owen film. I suspect they might not have had any good film elements to work with as the Wontner films are much sharper and darker. I've seen these films 2 or 3 times already and they're all fairly entertaining. I like Wontner as Sherlock more than Owen.
I wasn't that impressed with the extras. I tried all the commentaries. I bailed on the one by Jennifer Churchill on The Fatal Hour because she wasn't that interesting and giggle too often at her own comments. I quit listing to the Atkins and Breckman on A Study In Scarlet because they had too much uninteresting banter and laughed at their own jokes too much. The Ney commentary on The Triumph of Sherlock Holmes was fairly good but he spent too much time on studio history than the film. The Sutton & Legan commentary on Silver Blaze was mostly worth listening to though it had a bit of time wasting banter. The Sam Sherman featurettes were short and sort of interesting. The short films and other Sherlock items were a mixed bag, mostly public domain material but not the best of that sort of thing.
I'm glad to get the nice versions of the Wontner films and will watch those again sometime. The rest I'd pretty much skip across the board. I got no time for it.
Here's the list of what's on each disc.
Disc 1
- The Fatal Hour (1931) featuring Arthur Wontner
- Essay by Don Stradley
- Commentary Track with Jennifer Churchill
- The Adventures of Sam Sherman: Part One featurette
- Recreated Sherlock Holmes Radio Broadcast
- A Black Sherlock Holmes (1918) cut bonus short
- A Black Sherlock Holmes (1918) uncut bonus short
- Baffled (1900)
Disc 2
- The Triumph of Sherlock Holmes (1935) featuring Arthur Wontner
- Essay by Jason A. Ney
- Commentary Track with Jason A Ney
- The Adventures of Sam Sherman: Part Two featurette
- The Copper Beeches (1912)
- Blind Man's Bluff TV episode (1954)
Disc 3
- Silver Blaze (1937) featuring Arthur Wontner
- Essay by Don Stradley
- Commentary Track with Phoef Sutton & Jordan Legan
- The Adventures of Sam Sherman: Part Three featurette
- Sure Luck Holmes Felix the Cat cartoon
- Cousins of Sherlocko (1913)
Disc 4
- A Study in Scarlet (1933) featuring Reginald Owen
- Essay by C. Courtney Joyner
- Commentary Track with Peter Atkins & David Breckman
- Elementary Cinema an original production by Ballyhoo Motion Pictures
- Slick Sleuths Mutt & Jeff cartoon
Also includes:
- 4 original poster replications in ease disc case
Comments