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Post by naterdawg on Feb 24, 2017 18:54:41 GMT
Isn't that a great name? "Basil Rathbone." Say it slowly. Let the letters just slip off your tongue. Baaasilll Rrrrathbone!
If ever there was an actor with a great name and the ability to ENUNCIATE clearly, it's Basil Rathbone. He was the ultimate Sherlock Holmes and one of the best on-screen villains, to boot. Loved him in David Copperfield and The Adventures of Robin Hood. He was lucky enough to have a long and fruitful career...as a kid, I remember him in the AIP shockers, Tales of Terror and Comedy of Terrors. Really, a classic actor who commanded the screen whenever he was front and center!
Anybody else have any favorite Basil RAAAthbone performances?
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Post by teleadm on Feb 24, 2017 19:32:43 GMT
Basil (Yes it's fun to say) Rathbone in "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" 1939 where he does a Music Hall number (maybe still on Youtube), a movie I thought was more entertaining than the more well known "The Hound of the Baskervilles" 1939.
"The Court Jester" 1956 were he was the ultimate slimy calculating evil, and a sort of parody of his old swashbuckler roles. If you don't like Danny Kaye it's a dragging first 40 minutes before Basil appears.
I agree with all "naterdawg's" suggestions.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 24, 2017 20:18:46 GMT
I enjoyed his Sherlock Holmes films, and when he was a heavy in films as well. In addition, I really enjoy hearing his appearances on the Jack Benny radio show! Playing himself as a neighbor to Benny every once in a while, his lighthearted and comedic side shone through. One of Basil's Radio Appearances on Jack Benny
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Post by Wesley Crusher on Feb 24, 2017 20:36:39 GMT
Basil Rathbone (21 feature films seen - ranked in order) *Terrific actor ... he's always one of the best parts of any film he is in*
Captain Blood (1935) The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) If I Were King (1938) A Tale of Two Cities (1935) The Black Cat (1941) The Mark of Zorro (1940) The Dawn Patrol (1938) The Comedy of Terrors (1963) Casanova's Big Night (1954) Anna Karenina (1935)
Son of Frankenstein (1939) The Black Sheep (1956) Heartbeat (1946) Sin Takes a Holiday (1930) Private Number (1936) The Garden of Allah (1936) The Last Hurrah (1958) The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini (1966) The Court Jester (1955) Romeo and Juliet (1936)
The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949)
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Post by naterdawg on Feb 25, 2017 2:33:23 GMT
Oh, yeah, how could I forget his performance as "Wolf Von Frankenstein" in Son of Frankenstein?! I also remember him in Mark of Zorro, memorable for a great sword fight. Basil knew how to use the sabre!
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Post by goodfella2459 on Feb 26, 2017 12:39:45 GMT
He is my favourite Sherlock Holmes. My favourites of the Holmes films are The Scarlet Claw & Pearl of Death, although I like pretty much all of them (except for the war/spy ones early on, but thankfully there were only two of them).
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Post by naterdawg on Feb 26, 2017 19:40:15 GMT
The Scarlet Claw is also my favorite Rathbone Holmes. You have good taste!
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Post by telegonus on Mar 2, 2017 3:34:24 GMT
Basil Rathbone's my favorite Sherlock, even as I respect Jeremy Brett, the Bazz rules. I think that he was himself literally the product of the Victorian era helped make him more credible than just about any of the later Sherlocks.
Aside from Sherlock, it's tough for me to choose just one Rathbone performance. He was excellent in all those big budget costume and literary films of the middle to late Thirties (David Copperfield, The Last Days Of Pompeii, A Tale Of Two Cities, et al).
One later Rathbone performance that stands out, maybe partly because I saw the movie in the theater when it came out and also because I've watched it fairly recently on television (in the past six months, roughly) is his mesmerist in the final entry of Roger Corman's Tales Of Terror (Facts In the Case Of M.Valdemar, I believe is the title). Rathbone looks good in it and his playing is game and convincing, especially considering that he was around seventy at the time.
Like Boris Karloff, Rathbone got old but he never lost it, not to the best of my recollection anyway.
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Post by naterdawg on Mar 2, 2017 5:13:28 GMT
No, I don't think he lost it, not by any means. Actually, I think Tales of Terror was what introduced me to Rathbone back in the early 60s, and I found out about his earlier film work--including Sherlock Holmes--later. I really have to hand it to AIP; they employed these older horror icons and really showed them off in quality vehicles. I love the look of Tales of Terror, for example. Done on a shoestring, but everything is so elegant--even the mesmerizing lamp looks cool. And was there ever a more gorgeous heroine than Debra Paget?
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Post by geode on Mar 2, 2017 6:44:47 GMT
Nobody was a better opposing villain to Errol Flynn's heroes, and they created the best fencing duels captured on film. Yet, he also created one of the best heroes in film history, my favorite Sherlock Holmes. I admired him from an early age, but my mother had done this long before my birth. She used to joke that they once said of Bas, "Two profiles in search of a face."
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Post by telegonus on Mar 2, 2017 7:45:36 GMT
No, I don't think he lost it, not by any means. Actually, I think Tales of Terror was what introduced me to Rathbone back in the early 60s, and I found out about his earlier film work--including Sherlock Holmes--later. I really have to hand it to AIP; they employed these older horror icons and really showed them off in quality vehicles. I love the look of Tales of Terror, for example. Done on a shoestring, but everything is so elegant--even the mesmerizing lamp looks cool. And was there ever a more gorgeous heroine than Debra Paget? Tales Of Terror was probably my introduction to Rathbone as well. A beautiful looking film indeed, even today on television. I'm probably in the minority on this but for me even the fakeness, such as the cartoony exteriors, look right. The first and last tales are my favorites. Morella actually moved me, and still does. Love that mansion on the cliff, with the elegant interior (how the hell did Vincent Price's character move around in there with all those cobwebs? ). Love that tarantula. What would an AIP horror be without one? That the setting is New England is neither here nor there. Maybe Vincent bought the spider through the mail to kill off insects and mice. The middle story is actually the most lavish looking, with real (back lot) city streets and a tavern. Yet even my love for Peter Lorre can't save it. There are good things in it but it drags. Also, too much plot, and too much dialogue. Roger Corman was good with actors, had a great eye, hired talented people to make his movies look bigger than they were but he was no storyteller. His shock effects were good. This is where the final tale is sublime. That mesmerizing lamp I think made a return engagement in the next year's The Terror. It's a great prop. Rathbone's perfidy does not for some reason make him loathsome, or not to me anyway. He's a lonely old dude looking for a babe, and I find his playing strangely sympathetic. The image of Vincent's (literal) meltdown stayed with me for years
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Post by naterdawg on Mar 2, 2017 14:18:01 GMT
I agree with you on all points. To me, Poe was definitely not funny, so whenever AIP would inject humor into what I considered a "horror movie" scenario, it fell flat. Didn't help that Les Baxter always concocted some wacky music to accompany the supposedly funny hijinks. I expected that stuff in Beach Party flicks, especially when Von Zipper was on the scene--but it didn't work in the Raven nor the Black Cat segment of Tales of Terror.
As for the Valdemar segment, I remember how disappointed I was when we didn't get a clear shot of Vincent Price's rotting make-up. That infamous still with Debra Paget screaming beside him certainly whet my appetite, and it's a GREAT make-up--really a stand-out for the Poe movies. Nonetheless, Corman pretty much followed the story, outside of creating a villain for the piece, and Poe's original tale is VERY gruesome in the end!
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Post by snsurone on Mar 2, 2017 22:40:28 GMT
He was a superb swordsman who, IRL, could easily have defeated Ty and Errol. But he was amazed at how quickly Danny Kaye learned the sport, even to confessing that eventually, Danny could outfence him. Of course, Basil was considerably older than in his ROBIN HOOD days, and his reflexes might have weakened a bit.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 7, 2017 5:02:56 GMT
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Post by Primemovermithrax Pejorative on Mar 7, 2017 6:38:19 GMT
Hillbillies in the Haunted House is painful. Sad that he had to have that movie as one of his last, especially since he could have co-starred with Peter Cushing in the Blood Beast Terror if he had lived a little longer (not a great movie but much better than Hillbillies).
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