William Gillette as Holmes, in the long-lost film that is lost no longer |
It’s a
mystery worthy of the Great Detective himself: More than 100 films about
Sherlock Holmes are lost or in need of restoration or preservation.
The great
William Gillette’s silent film of his classic stage play Sherlock Holmes
was like that – lost for decades – until a print was found in Paris in 2014. Now
the UCLA Film & Television Archive have teamed up with the Baker Street
Irregulars to search world-wide for similar treasures.
Among the missing
are a British production of A Study in
Scarlet, produced in 1914; a Danish series, produced by Nordisk films,
beginning in 1908; and The Missing
Rembrandt, produced in 1932, starring Arthur Wontner.
The Archive
and the BSI plan to contact film archives, Sherlock Holmes societies, film
historians, collectors, and other potential sources around the world to find,
restore, and eventually screen these and other currently lost films.
Barbara
Roisman Cooper, an Archive Board and BSI member, is heading the project, which
is called “Searching for Sherlock: The Game’s Afoot.” For further information
about the effort or suggestions regarding the search, she asks that you contact
her at peninc1@aol.com.
A week ago,
on this blog, I reveled in the joys of putting on a Sherlockian film festival.
How I would love to be able to show The Missing Rembrandt – which is now
missing itself!
Surely a copy of REMBRANDT will turn up sooner or later. And, has anyone found all of Eille Norwood's films? The fragments I've seen are precious! Hopefully, next to the cans with the Norwood footage will be a print of Lon Chaney, Sr. in LONDON AFTER MIDNIGHT (1922). Just sayin'...
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