Saturday, October 10, 2009

TRAILER: SHERLOCK HOLMES MOVIE TRAILER WITH DOWNEY AND LAW

On the off chance that you've been living under a rock and haven't seen it yet, here's the 2nd trailer for Guy Ritchie's SHERLOCK HOLMES with Robert Downey Jr., Jude Law and Rachel McAdams. The film is being released theatrically on December 25th 2009 (Christmas Day).

Yep, I know, lazy post, but it's Saturday night on a long weekend. More interesting material in the days ahead...





Friday, October 9, 2009

BOOK: THE IMPROBABLE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES


THE IMPROBABLE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES
Edited by John Joseph Adams
Night Shade Books 2009
Trade Paperback
454 pages
ISBN - 10: 1597801607
ISBN - 13: 978-1597801607

THE IMPROBABLE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES is a new (September 2009) reprint anthology (with one original story) that collects 28 Sherlock Holmes stories published in the last 30 years, most, but not all, of which contain fantastic, supernatural or horror elements, hence the 'Improbable' contained in the title. Featured are stories by a good many mainstream 'big name' authors like Stephen King, Neil Gaiman, Laurie R. King, Anne Perry, etc... alongside various mid-list, as well as up-and-coming, authors. The oldest story is Stephen King's "The Doctor's Case" (first published in THE NEW ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES in 1987) and the most recent are Barbara Roden's "The Things that Shall Come Upon Them" and Chris Roberson's "Merridew of Abominable Memory" both of which were published last year in my original anthology GASLIGHT GRIMOIRE: FANTASTIC TALES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES. While the veteran reader of Sherlockian pastiche may be familiar with a large chunk of the stories from their original publications, the neophyte will be quite happy to have these interesting and varied stories in one inexpensive trade paperback volume. Recommended!


Contents:

Introduction — John Joseph Adams
A Sherlockiana Primer — Christopher Roden

The Doctor’s Case — Stephen King
The Horror of the Many Faces — Tim Lebbon
The Case of the Bloodless Sock — Anne Perry
The Adventure of the Other Detective — Bradley H. Sinor
A Scandal in Montreal — Edward Hoch
The Adventure of the Field Theorems — Vonda N. McIntyre
The Adventure of the Death-Fetch — Darrell Schweitzer
The Shocking Affair of the Dutch Steamship Friesland — Mary Robinette Kowal
The Adventure of the Mummy’s Curse — H. Paul Jeffers
The Things That Shall Come Upon Them — Barbara Roden
Murder to Music — Anthony Burgess
The Adventure of the Inertial Adjustor — Stephen Baxter
Mrs Hudson’s Case — Laurie R. King
The Singular Habits of Wasps — Geoffrey Landis
The Affair of the Forty-Sixth Birthday — Amy Myers
The Specter of Tullyfane Abbey — Peter Tremayne
The Vale of the White Horse — Sharyn McCrumb
The Adventure of the Dorset Street Lodger — Michael Moorcock
The Adventure of the Lost World — Dominic Green
The Adventure of the Antiquarian’s Niece — Barbara Hambly
Dynamics of a Hanging — Tony Pi
Merridew of Abominable Memory — Chris Roberson
Commonplaces — Naomi Novik
The Adventure of the Pirates of Devil’s Cape — Rob Rogers
The Adventure of the Green Skull — Mark Valentine
The Human Mystery — Tanith Lee
A Study in Emerald — Neil Gaiman
You See But You Do Not Observe — Robert J. Sawyer

Cover by David Palumbo

Editor John Joseph Adams has an excellent mini-site dedicated to the book that includes some free fiction, the complete essay by Christopher Roden and various other fun odds and ends. To visit the book's mini-site, click here.

The book is available in fine bookstores everywhere or from the following Amazon links:

Amazon USA
Amazon Canada
Amazon UK

DVD: SHERLOCK HOLMES ARCHIVE COLLECTION AVAILABLE OCTOBER 20, 2009


Coming to Region 1 (North America) DVD on October 20, 2009  is a 3-disc boxed set from Synergy Entertainment called SHERLOCK HOLMES: THE ARCHIVE COLLECTION. While a number of the pieces collected here will be familiar to folks who picked up a couple compilation videos by Video Yesteryear in the 1980s or a later retread called Sherlock Holmes: The Early Years, this does contain a few rarities first seeing the light of day in this package. Most noteworthy is Sting of Death with Boris Karloff. This was an adaptation of H.F. Heard's novel A TASTE FOR HONEY which aired on February 22, 1955 on ABC-TV as part of "The Elgin Hour" and hasn't been available for viewing ever since - except for prints in film museums. While I don't expect much in the way of decent film quality from Synergy Entertainment, it should be better than the old vhs packages I mentioned previously. The full contents are listed below.

DISC ONE
Sherlock Holmes' Fatal Hour - Arthur Wontner, 1931.
Lost in Limehouse - Olaf Hytten as Sheerluck Jones, 1933.
Limejuice Mystery - Herlock Sholmes marionettes, 1930.

DISC TWO
Sting of Death - Boris Karloff as the mysterious Mycroft, 1955.
The Man Who Disappeared - John Longden as Sherlock, 1951.
A Case of Hypnosis - Prof. Lightskull the chimpanzee! 1952.
Strange Case of Hennessy - Cliff Edwards as Silo Dance, 1933.

DISC THREE
The Speckled Band - Alan Napier as Sherlock, 1949.
The Copper Beeches - Georges Treville, 1912, with special musical score.
Man With The Twisted Lip - Eille Norwood, 1921, with special musical score.
The Screaming Bishop - Hairlock Combs cartoon, 1944.
Bonus Film starring Basil Rathbone as an army officer in The General's Boots from 1954.

The DVD collection is available from your favourite DVD dealers or can be ordered from Amazon USA

Thursday, October 8, 2009

AUDIO CD: THREE SHERLOCK HOLMES AUDIO DRAMAS FROM BIG FINISH


UK audio producer Big Finish is releasing a range of Sherlock Holmes audio drama, one a month, in November 2009, December 2009 and January 2010. The first two programmes feature Roger Llewellyn as Holmes and are based on the one-man plays written by Sherlockian David Stuart Davies. Llewellyn has been touring the UK with both plays, on and off, for a few years now, so these recordings will be welcome for those who have not been able to see them. The first to be released in November is SHERLOCK HOLMES: THE LAST ACT followed by SHERLOCK HOLMES: THE DEATH AND LIFE in December. Following on in January is SHERLOCK HOLMES: HOLMES AND THE RIPPER written by The Avengers scribe, the legendary Brian Clemens. This programme features Nicholas Briggs (the voice of the Daleks in Doctor Who) as Holmes, Richard Earl as Watson and India Fisher (Charley Pollard in the Big Finish Doctor Who audio series) as Katherine Mead.

The programmes are currently available for pre-order on CD at the Big Finish site.

STAMPS: ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE HONOURED AS EMINENT BRITON BY ROYAL MAIL


Sherlock Holmes creator Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is one of ten British individuals honoured with a stamp by the UK's Royal Mail this week. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle shares the distinction with Fred Perry, Henry Purcell, Sir Matt Busby, William Gladstone, Mary Wollstonecraft, Donald Campbell, Judy Fryd, Samuel Johnson and Sir Martin Ryle. A variety of first day covers, stamp sheets, stamp cards, etc...of the Eminent Britons series can ordered through any good philatelic supplier or directly through the Royal Mail Online Shop, which ships internationally.

Click here to visit the Royal Mail Shop now.

 For more information on Detective Fiction Character and Author stamps check out this Detective Fiction on Stamps site.



Wednesday, October 7, 2009

DVD: THE ASYLUM'S CASH-IN SHERLOCK HOLMES MOVIE

Known for releasing similarly named or near knock-off variations of current blockbuster titles (Transmorphers, Terminators, The Day the Earth Stopped, etc...) it should come as no surprise that The Asylum is taking aim at exploiting the expected popularity of Guy Ritchie's forthcoming big-screen release SHERLOCK HOLMES. The Asylum indicates a DTV release date of January 26, 2010 for their film, creatively titled SHERLOCK HOLMES.

Shot on the cheap in Wales, the film features Ben Snyder (erm..who?) as Sherlock Holmes, Gareth David-Lloyd (Torchwood) as Watson with Dominic Keating (Enterprise) along, presumably as Spring Heeled Jack...who looks decidedly like a steampunk take on Iron Man. Got to hand it to The Asylum for managing to knock-off two Robert Downey films in one go!

The one-line description for the direct-to-video film? Now...Don't laugh...

"Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's famous detective faces the ultimate challenge when enormous monsters attack London."

Visit The Asylum website for more pics and marginally more info. Look for it on DVD at your local Blockbuster in late January 2010. You've been warned! ;-)

BOOK: SHERLOCK HOLMES HANDBOOK BY CHRIS REDMOND NEW EDITION

SHERLOCK HOLMES HANDBOOK: SECOND EDITION
By Christopher Redmond
Dundurn 2009, 336 pages
Paperback
ISBN - 10: 1554884462
ISBN-13: 978-1554884469

Canadian Sherlockian scholar Chris Redmond's invaluable resource A SHERLOCK HOLMES HANDBOOK (originally published in 1993) has been updated to reflect the wealth of changes in the Sherlockian world over the last 16 years. On his excellent site www.sherlockian. net Chris describes his reasoning behind the new edition.

"...Things do change over the years, and it's more than time for a new edition, catching up on new films and books (a few with a hint of the supernatural) and the advent of the Internet, which (as you may have noticed since you're here) has spread Sherlock Holmes's fame and Sherlockian fun even farther worldwide. These years have brought three multi-volume editions of the Holmes stories, with hundreds of footnotes providing new insight and amusement. They have also seen Holmes appear repeatedly on the amateur and professional stages . . . and there have been changs to everything from copyright law and library collections to booksellers and audio recordings.

I've touched on it all, I hope, with nine chapters covering the original Sherlock Holmes stories (how they appear and continue to appear), the characters and themes, the author, the Victorian era, policing, detective fiction, parodies, films, radio and television, Sherlockian societies and writings, museums, and the eternal question: what is it we love about Sherlock Holmes anyway?"

It really is an excellent and invaluable resource that belongs on the shelf of beginner/casual readers and veteran Sherlockians alike! Now available from all good booksellers under the slightly revised title of SHERLOCK HOLMES HANDOOK. Pick up a copy today or order it using one of the links below. Highly Recommended!

Amazon USA

Amazon Canada

Amazon UK


Tuesday, October 6, 2009

DVD: 1968 BBC SHERLOCK HOLMES SERIES COMES TO REGION 1 DVD ON DECEMBER 15, 2009

A&E Home Entertainment will be releasing all 5 existing episodes ( the BBC wiped the rest in an economy drive) of the 1968 BBC Sherlock Holmes series starring Peter Cushing and Nigel Stock as Holmes and Watson to Region 1 (North America) DVD in December 2009. The boxed set is comprised of: The Hound of the Baskervilles (parts 1 & 2), The Sign of the Four, The Blue Carbuncle, A Study in Scarlet and The Boscombe Valley Mystery.

Click here to pre-order the set from Amazon USA.

Cushing is a fantastic Holmes and, to my mind, his performance in this series marks him as one of the great interpreters of the role. While I loved his work in the 1958 Hammer film version of THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES, he's far less frantic and even better in the BBC series. Nigel Stock is a staunch, loyal and largely convincing Watson. The chemistry between Cushing and Stock is apparent and the two actors play off of each other beautifully. The two-part HOUND rates as one of the most faithful versions ever produced for film or television. A definite 'must have' for North American Sherlock Holmes fans. Highly Recommended!

COMIC: DYNAMITE'S SHERLOCK HOLMES ISSUE 5 OF 5 STREETS OCTOBER 7, 2009

The fifth and final issue of Dynamite's SHERLOCK HOLMES series The Trial of Sherlock Holmes comes to its conclusion in the fifth issue which reaches comic book stores on October 7, 2009. Story by Leah Moore and John Reppion with interior art by Aaron Campbell and a cover by John Cassaday.

Preview and details available at the Dynamite Entertainment website

"The acclaimed mystery from Dynamite concludes. Can the world's greatest detective unravel his greatest mystery? Find out in the conclusion of "The Trial of Sherlock Holmes!"

A hardcover edition collecting the 5 issue SHERLOCK HOLMES: TRIAL OF SHERLOCK HOLMES series will be released shortly (October/November). The hardcover contains bonus material such as script pages, annotations, an essay by Les Klinger, a cover gallery, and a complete Sherlock Holmes short story by Arthur Conan Doyle with new illustrations.

To pre-order the hardcover visit the Baker Street Dozen Sherlock Holmes Amazon shop here.