On the plus side, Olive's new Blu-ray, licensed from MGM via that company's Orion library, looks great and, unexpectedly, has impressively vigorous DTS-HD 2.0 surround stereo.

The movie is built around the premise that Sherlock Holmes is the entirely fictitious creation of Dr. John Watson (Ben Kingsley). Some years back Watson, dabbling in the art of detection, had solved a high-profile case but, fearing that the conservative hospital to which he had recently applied would look down on such activities, created the character of Sherlock Holmes.

By the time the story opens, Sherlock Holmes is now a famous celebrity, whose cases, documented by Watson, are regularly published in Strand Magazine. He has hired down-and-out actor Reginald Kincaid (Michael Caine) to play Holmes in public. Only housekeeper Mrs. Hudson (Pat Keen) and Watson's "Baker Street Irregulars," soot-covered ragamuffins who forage for clues on his behalf, are aware of the ruse.

Kincaid, however, is a constant thorn in Watson's side. He's a womanizer, an incorrigible gambler, and a drunk. Kincaid is also extremely dense. Only his confidence as an actor and Watson's constant, careful choreography of client meetings and investigations obscure Kincaid's total incompetence.

Fed up, Watson tries going at it alone, but as "The Crime Doctor," Watson finds he has none of the cache that the fictional character he fabricated possesses, even though Watson's genius, of course, remains unaffected. He opts to use Kincaid for one last case: printing plates for five-pound banknotes have been stolen from the Bank of England, threatening to collapse the British Empire's entire economy. Soon enough, it becomes clear that only a criminal mastermind the likes of arch-nemesis Professor Moriarty (Paul Freeman, late of Raiders of the Lost Ark) could be behind the scheme.

The appeal of the literary Holmes, as well as in nearly all of the movies and various TV adaptations, is founded on the principle that Watson is the single humanizing link for Holmes's intellect, an intellect so vast, even torturous, that he can't really function as an ordinary human being. He's wildly eccentric and vaguely misanthropic. But Watson recognizes this dichotomy. Watson profoundly admires Holmes's skills, and forever patiently struggles to reach those little vulnerable bits of the great detective's human side, which few others ever even glimpse.

In Without a Clue Holmes and Watson are practically adversaries. Watson is constantly irritable, forever annoyed by Holmes/Kincaid's foolishness and irresponsibility. Here Watson is both the genius and the familiar, warm Victorian gentleman of the stories, but he's never warm toward Holmes. It might have helped the film had the writers found room for Watson to at least appreciate Kincaid's skills as an actor, to realize that Kincaid's an integral part of the legend Watson created. Literally in the film's final minute there's a sense that the two characters have finally realized this and have even become friends, but this epiphany should have come far earlier in the story.

Instead, Dr. Watson is merely unlikeable, which is why Ben Kingsley comes off much worse than Michael Caine, because problems roll off Kincaid, who's unfazed except when in harm's way. In this offbeat role, Caine seems to be having a whale of a time, and his obvious delight goes a long way toward salvaging the picture.

It's a shame, really, because so much of the film is spot-on. Nigel Davenport, for instance, plays a typically stuffy high-ranking official in Her Majesty's government, the kind of character that frequently turns up in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's stories. He is impatient and at times dubious about Holmes's ability to solve the case, while at other times dazzled by his extraordinary deductions. Davenport nails the part, delivering a subtly amusing performance. American actor Jeffrey Jones is also fine as Inspector Lestrade, bringing to his character all the complexities of his literary counterpart, and there's even a hint near the end that he's aware of Watson's ruse. Peter Cook, who played Holmes in the reviled but actually funnier spoof of The Hound of the Baskervilles (1978) turns up here in an amusing scene as Strand's editor.

The movie is fairly lavish, more so certainly than the concurrent Sherlock Holmes television series with Jeremy Brett, yet these fine production values, particularly Mancini's score, tend to overwhelm the slightness of the material.

Video & Audio

Without a Clue's 1080p, 1.85:1 widescreen transfer is very good and essentially problem-free. Even more impressive though is its DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mix, which shows off Mancini's score to good effect and is aggressively directional, with many sound effects channeled to the side and surround speakers. No alternate audio or subtitles, however. Extra Features

The lone supplement is a trailer, in HD, straining to sell the film. It's in good shape as well.

Parting Thoughts

A nice try, but Without a Clue just misses the mark. Obviously written with informed affection for its characters and boasting several fine performances, particularly by Michael Caine, it's built around a premise that just doesn't quite come off. For Sherlock Holmes aficionados, however, the picture is definitely worth seeing once, and for this reason plus the strong transfer it's Recommended.

Stuart Galbraith IV is the Kyoto-based film historian and publisher-editor of World Cinema Paradise. His credits include film history books, DVD and Blu-ray audio commentaries and special features.