SnoopyStyle It's 1891 London. Sherlock Holmes (Nicol Williamson) is suffering delusions from his cocaine use and convinced of Professor James Moriarty (Laurence Olivier) as a master criminal. A concerned Dr. John H. Watson (Robert Duvall) decides to create a fictional case for Sherlock to chase to Vienna where he could get treatment from experimental psychotherapist Dr. Sigmund Freud (Alan Arkin). He recruits Mycroft Holmes to force Moriarty to lead Sherlock on the chase. Sherlock arrives at Sigmund's office and is convinced to be treated by his 7% solution. As he recovers from withdrawal, Sherlock deduces Freud's patient Lola Deveraux (Vanessa Redgrave) had escaped from an abductor and recalls a memory of buried secrets.It's a compelling reimagining of the fictional characters. The journey to Vienna is a bit of Sherlock fun. His treatment slows the movie down. It would be more compelling to have Sherlock investigate the case while fully in withdrawal and the delusional snake montage can be trimmed down. The investigating trio is rather intriguing. The acting is generally excellent. The case is circuitous and sometimes muddled. The bad guys are obvious from the start. For a Sherlock Holmes mystery, it needs to be better. The final reveal isn't quite as shocking as the movie wants it to be. Otherwise, this is a great concept.

richard-1787 Once the mystery got underway, I really enjoyed this movie.I wish it had spent less time at the beginning taking us into the very realistic details of Holmes' cocaine addiction. It does give Alan Arkin a chance to show what a very fine actor he is, but I confess I didn't particularly enjoy watching him suffer so.I admit that when we find out what has happened to Miss Devereux, and why, it seems almost silly - and therefore quite different from the early tone of the movie - but that does lead to a lot of lighthearted dueling, etc., on a train - two trains, actually - flying through the Balkan countryside.And a "borrowing" from *Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea*, when the second train runs out of coal.Still, if you can get through the seriousness of the first part, the rest of the movie is fun.And it even has a rather tacked-on, unexpected romantic end.

jacobs-greenwood Produced and directed by Herbert Ross, novelist Nicholas Meyer used Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's characters to write an interesting crime mystery involving Sherlock Holmes, his loyal and trusty companion Dr. Watson, and Dr. Sigmund Freud!Though the drama begins as an exploration into the destructive nature of cocaine addiction (the title refers to the concentration of cocaine Holmes self-injected), and how it almost leads to the famous detective's undoing, it devolves into a comedy adventure of sorts after Freud helps Holmes fight this weakness.The cast, which is excellent, includes Nicol Williamson as Holmes, Robert Duvall as Dr. Watson (and the film's occasional narrator), Alan Arkin as Dr. Freud, Laurence Olivier as Holmes's nemesis Professor Moriarty, plus Vanessa Redgrave, Joel Grey, and Jeremy Kemp, who figure in the mystery. Samantha Eggar appears briefly as Watson's wife, Morstan. Screenplay writer Meyer and Costume Designer Alan Barrett received their only Oscar nominations for their work on this film.Watson (Duvall) is naturally concerned that his friend, the eminent detective Sherlock Holmes (Williamson), has become a paranoid recluse that believes that Professor Moriarty (Olivier) is out to get him. In fact, it is Moriarty, who Holmes is stalking, that makes Watson aware of the detective's irrational obsession.Upon investigation, Watson discovers that Holmes is under the influence of cocaine. He'd also learned that there is some tragedy in the two's shared past beyond the fact that Moriarty was a difficult calculus instructor of Holmes's; Moriarty refused to reveal anything else. Watson decides to visit Holmes's brother Mycroft (Charles Gray) who is able to use this secret past against Moriarty to get him to lead his brother to Vienna, where Dr. Freud (Arkin) has been able to help those with similar addictions.The most incredible display of the great detective's powers of perception and deductive reasoning occurs shortly after Holmes meets Freud - merely by walking through the doctor's flat, Holmes is able to tell Freud's life story to date!After a long and arduous 'drying out' period, wrought with hallucinations, and assisted by some hypnosis from Dr. Freud, Holmes is introduced to one of the doctor's former patients, a famous actress named Lola Deveraux (Redgrave). Deveraux had been 'cured' of her cocaine addiction by Freud, but she is found in a hospital, partially under its influence again, after allegedly trying to kill herself. Holmes deduces that she'd been bound and forced into using the drug, and had actually been trying to escape.This leads the three men (Holmes, Watson, & Freud) to follow a strange little man (Joel Grey, playing Lowenstein) that fits Deveraux's brief description of her abductor. After this man leads them into a trap in which they're almost killed, Holmes realizes to late that they'd been distracted so that the perpetrator could recapture Ms. Deveraux.It turns out that the man responsible for her abduction is Baron von Leinsdorf (Kemp), who had earlier made an antisemitic comment to Freud at their club and lost a real tennis (not what you think) match to the doctor, who'd wanted satisfaction. Assisted by Deveraux, who'd dropped flowers like 'bread crumbs' enabling them to follow her, the three men capture Lowenstein and figure out that the Baron is responsible.It is at this point in the story that the film becomes a wild, cross continent chase more than anything else, with predictable results. However, one does finally learn, while Freud has Holmes under hypnosis, the root causes of the detective's cocaine addiction and the reason why Moriarty was involved in his fantasies.

bkoganbing Ever since Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote those immortal words "quick Watson the needle", people have been interpreting that to mean that Sherlock Holmes is a drug addict. That's the point in which Dr. Watson decides that his old friend has been abusing long enough and needs a cure. And there's this new doctor in Vienna named Sigmund Freud who is breaking new grounds with mental health therapy. That is the basis of The Seven-Per-Cent Solution where the fictional world of Holmes and the and real world of Freud meet and essentially mate.The Baker Street purists are like highbrow Trekkies, for them Holmes is an absolutely real character. In fact I just saw the John Mills-Leslie Banks film Cottage To Let where one of the characters, a young cockney lad proclaims that for him "Sherlock Holmes was the greatest person whoever lived". He's so real that within the time that Conan Doyle wrote his stories you can graft Holmes almost at any point within that time as a character as was done in this film.Robert Duvall as Dr. Watson has left Baker Street to resume his medical practice and soon enough gets a summons from Mrs. Hudson the landlady at Baker Street to come running. Holmes's craving for cocaine has gotten out of hand and she's at her wits end.Nicol Williamson plays Sherlock Holmes and he's going through some bad withdrawal, keeps raving about one Professor Moriarty as the root of all evil in the British Empire. Appealing to his inability to pass up a mystery and his obsession with the Professor who is a teacher of mathematics at some English public school, Duvall tricks Holmes into a trip to Vienna to see Dr. Freud.Alan Arkin plays Freud and the scenes between Dr. Freud and patient Holmes are something else. At the time Freud was using hypnotic techniques which up to that time were just parlor game tricks or used for more sinister purposes to get at the root of Holmes narcotic dependency. Later on when a mystery surrounding another of Arkin's addicted patients Vanessa Redgrave surfaces it is Williamson the teacher and Arkin the pupil when they start playing Holmes's ballpark.The greatest mind in Vienna also suffered cruelly from the anti-Semitism of his time. Freud's 'duel' on the tennis court with Baron Jeremy Kemp is a classic and as it turns out Kemp is the root of the mystery involving Redgrave.The Seven-Per-Cent Solution received two Oscar nominations for Best Costume Design and for adapted Screenplay. The recreation of the London and Vienna of the 1890s is marvelous and the final climax with the locomotive chase with Holmes, Freud, and Watson chasing down the villains is well staged.By the way, though his role is brief Laurence Olivier plays Moriarty and it turns out he did a worse sin to Sherlock Holmes than be the head of all the crime in the British Empire.