The Hound of the Baskervilles
Movie, 1939, Victorian London, Set in Dartmoor, 1889
The Hound of the Baskervilles is #1 of 26 in release order and #10 of 26 in chronological order in the Sherlock Holmes.
The story
When a nobleman is threatened by a family curse on his newly inherited estate, detective Sherlock Holmes is hired to investigate.
The Hound of the Baskervilles recap
The Hound of the Baskervilles (1939) is the first of fourteen films starring Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes and Nigel Bruce as Dr. Watson, directed by Sidney Lanfield for 20th Century Fox and the first Holmes film set in Victorian times. In 1889, Dr. Mortimer tells Holmes about the death of Sir Charles Baskerville on the Devonshire moor, the footprints of a gigantic hound beside his body, and the family curse. Holmes sends Watson to Baskerville Hall with the heir, Sir Henry (Richard Greene), while he claims to be too busy. Watson finds the butler signalling to someone on the moor and hears howling at night; the hound kills an escaped convict wearing Sir Henry's clothes, and Holmes turns out to have been on the moor all along, disguised as a peddler.
The Hound of the Baskervilles ending explained
The hound is a real, half-starved dog that the naturalist Jack Stapleton trained to attack Baskervilles by their scent. Holmes and Watson kill it just as it attacks Sir Henry. Stapleton traps Holmes in the hound's kennel and then poisons Sir Henry's medicine, but Holmes cuts his way out and destroys the poison in time, revealing that Stapleton is himself a Baskerville after the family fortune. Stapleton flees across the Grimpen Mire, with constables posted on every road.
Where to watch The Hound of the Baskervilles
The Hound of the Baskervilles is streaming on Kanopy, FlixFling, Fawesome, Mometu, and Tubi in the US. You can rent or buy it on Amazon, Apple TV, and Google Play.
Ratings
IMDb 7.4/10, Rotten Tomatoes 91%
Where it fits
- Release order: first, before The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.
- Chronological order: after Murder by Decree, before The Hound of the Baskervilles.
What to watch before The Hound of the Baskervilles
Nothing. The Hound of the Baskervilles (1939) doesn't continue an earlier version, so it stands on its own.
Cast
- Richard Greene as Sir Henry Baskerville
- Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes
- Wendy Barrie as Beryl Stapleton
- Nigel Bruce as Doctor John H. Watson
- Lionel Atwill as Dr. James Mortimer
- John Carradine as Barryman
- Barlowe Borland as Frankland
- Beryl Mercer as Mrs. Jennifer Mortimer
- Morton Lowry as John 'Jack' Stapleton
- Ralph Forbes as Sir Hugo Baskerville
- E. E. Clive as London Cabbie John Clayton
- Eily Malyon as Mrs. Barryman
Directed by Sidney Lanfield.