Watch The Hound of the Baskervilles For Free

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

With all the comic talent from the British Isles gathered into one film the Peter Cook/Dudley Moore version of The Hound Of The Baskervilles should have come out better than it was. Far from the best of Peter and Dudley, but it wasn't all that bad.Certainly Baker Street purists will be offended, but they're always offended in the least deviation of a Sherlock Holmes story. Then again you would have to change the plot of the story because a man being torn to shreds is hardly a good subject for humor.Knowing the plot of this most well known of Arthur Conan Doyle's stories about Sherlock Holmes the deviations can be plotted like on a road map. Peter Cook is as usual a most detached Sherlock Holmes, but not because he's constantly analyzing. He's got a mother who is constantly urging him into matrimony and not with Dr. Watson. And the man needs a vacation so he goes to Paris to sow a little bit of his version of wild oats.As Holmes fans know, he does dispatch Watson out to Baskerville Hall to lay the ground work while he dons disguise. The time apart from Watson here though introduces the comedy team of Dudley Moore and Kenneth Williams of the Carry On series. Williams made a specialty of playing silly twits and that's exactly how he plays the Baskerville heir who is the object of a fiendish plot to murder him and get his inheritance. I like him here as I do on the Carry On series.I can never give a bad review to a film that has Hugh Griffith who was blessed with those maniacal eyes with which he did so much in film roles. They helped get him an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his Arab sheik in Ben-Hur. He plays a swamp character on the famous Grimpen Mire.As for the fabled hound from hell. Well let's say he's been ballyhooed quite a bit.This isn't the best work of Cook and Moore, but it's not all that bad.

Peter Cook & Dudley Moore at there best & silliest! What more can you say about this film, look at the cast list! Every now and again a genius will appear, in any given profession, and comedy has had more than a few over the years. Some of those that spring to mind are 'Spike Milligan, The Two Ronnies, Eric Sykes, Monty Python & The Goodies'. If you like ANY of the above stars, chances are you will also love this one. In my eyes it's a must have for any collector of silly comedy, like myself. 'Peter Cook & Dudley Moore' must also be counted amongst the all-time greats for such films as 'The Hound of the Baskervilles and Bedazzled (the original one, not the remake!). Throughout the history of film making, there have been many claims made by those in the industry, about whichever project they are working on, at that given moment in time. Rarely do ANY of these films life up to the directors expectations. This film, on the other hand, is a true delight to watch again & again, each time finding something different, you had previously missed.

Looking at today's conveyor belt of mind-numbing remakes of old shows, idiot teen comedies and action fests that have great special effects but little else, it's easy to get very nostalgic about the 1970s. But the decade of Coppola, Scorcese, Altman, Malik, Bogdanovic etc produced its fair share of cow pats and what an 'Annis Mirablis' 1978 was for truly wretched cinema. Hot on the heals of 'Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band' (with the Bee Gees), 'Carry on Emmanuelle' and 'Renaldo and Clara' (a Bob Dylan vehicle..don't ask), came this fetid attempt to satire Holmes and Watson. First off, it has to said that the Cook-Moore contribution to postwar British comedy is immeasurable and would probably fit in third place after the Pythons and Goons. But even the greats have their off days and Pete and Dud were well off when they agreed to let Paul Morrisey direct a comedy that manages to bungle every comic moment. The falsetto Welsh accent of Watson (Moore) and the stage Jewish accent of Holmes (Cook) simply irritate and a very strong cast is completely wasted. Why, for example, is Spike Milligan only afforded a 'fleeting appearance'? Others do their best with lamentable gags. The urinating dog of Denholm Elliot isn't funny, simply disgusting and Roy Kinnear's flasher could have been funny but simply falls flat. Morrisey doesn't know whether to be clever and satiric, akin to 'Life of Brian', or cheerfully bawdy like a Carry On movie. The result is a movie that's neither seaside postcard humour nor the anarchistic satire that Pete and Dud had presented so well a decade before. A truly washed out Kenneth Williams, fresh off 'Emmanuelle' (Jesus wept) is slotted in, his usual flared-nostril, bulgy eyed caricature demolishing the myth that he was a great actor trapped by the Carry Ons. Better artistes like Henry 'Arthur Sultan' Woolf and Prunella 'Sybil' Scales simply have walk ons. Meanwhile, the look of the movie is cheap and stagey while Moore's piano score is out of place in a comedy. Given that he and Cook were successfully belting out the punk humour of Derek and Clive at the same time, this dog can't be explained by the fact that Cook was by then alcoholic and depressed. Perhaps Morrisey was really Moriarty in disguise.

A wonderful cast are here involved in what must be the lowest point in all their careers.For some reason Dudley Moore plays Dr.Watson as a high voiced Welshman,and Peter Cook gives Holmes a "stage Jewish" accent!Made up of series of draggy sketches,everything but the kitchen sink gets thrown into the pot-including "The Exorcist" and Pete and Dud's "one leg short" sketch;the result is an incoherent mess.Most potentially amusing moments are killed dead by the sloppy approach of Paul Morrissey's direction.No attempt is made to capture the mystery of the original story, and the players shout,mug and flail around among pathetic threadbare sets.According to Harry Thompson's biography of Cook,Pete and Dud were deeply unhappy about Morrissey's approach to the material,and saw they'd got themselves into a disaster.No wonder the off screen audience throw rotten vegetables at Dudley at the end.A truly stupid film. .....that rumbling noise whenever this film is shown is old Sir Arthur spinning in his grave!