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Conan Doyle und der Fall Edalji
West Germany 1966
produced by Max Gierke for Elan-Film/ZDF
directed by Karl-Heinz Bieber
starring Paul Klinger, Barbara Schmid, Alexander Golling, Alfons Höckmann, Harry Engel, Edburga Christin, Richard Lauffen, Paula Denk, Hans Elwenspoek, Kurt Hepperlin, Harald Baerow, Mathilde Zedler, Karl Striebeck, Ellen Frank, Hans Zesch-Ballot, Peter Mönch, Friedrich Maurer, Hartmut Reck, Harry Hertzsch
written by Alexandra Becker, Rolf Becker, music by Rolf Unkel
Arthur Conan Doyle
review by Mike Haberfelner
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A framing story has a journalist (Hartmut Reck) research the life of
Arthur Conan Doyle in the archives of his newspaper to honour Sherlock
Holmes' 75th birthday, and surprisingly, the registrar (Harry Hertzsch)
seems to know about the author's accomplishments without even having to
take a look at the files. And he also knows about a real life crime Doyle
solved back in the day ... It's the early 20th century, and Arthur Conan
Doyle (Paul Klinger) has grown tired of being associated with Sherlock
Holmes, especially since he has not only written a vast body of work not
featuring the detective, including some historical books, he also has
accomplishments in sports and politics to show for himself - so when he's
asked by Mrs. Edalji (Paula Denk) to get her son George (Harry Engel) out
of jail who has wrongly be accused of animal mutilations, his answer at
first is a resolute no, as he insists he's nothing like the character he
created. But both his fiancée Jean (Barbara Schmid) and his right-hand
man Wood (Alfons Höckmann) see there's something just about Mrs. Edalji's
request and something wrong with the case, so Doyle starts to investigate,
and finds not all is in order with the evidence - and as soon as the news
gets out that he does so, Edalji is released ... which is not a good
thing, as his name isn't exonerated, and he might never be permitted as a
lawyer again thus. So Doyle starts to investigate further, and finds out
much of the accusations against Edalji actually have to do with him being
of half-Indian heritage, and he's said to be a pagan killing animals for
evil rituals, even though his father (Richard Lauffen) is a pastor and has
been for many years. There's also a series of hateful letters, often
containing death threats, that have been attributed to Edalji, even though
there's no reason for him having written them - and eventually, Doyle
finds out there is a man in town who's, well, more than a little
suspicious, and while the local police captain (Hans Elvenspoek) blocks
Doyle's investigations for xenophobic reasons, there's an inspector (Kurt
Hepperlin) more sympathetic to the affair who sees to it that Doyle gets
all the evidence he needs. It's not enough for Edalji to be retried in
court, as such a practice was then unheard of in the British justice
system, but Edalji gets cleared in the court of public opinion, and the
case led to the creation of the Court of Criminal Appeal. Now
while much of this movie is of course dramatized, and Arthur Conan Doyle's
role in the case is overstated, as is his immersion in the character of Sherlock
Holmes - after all, it's fair to say that Doyle's interest
might have come more from political than investigative point of view -,
but the Edalji case is real, as is the creation of the Court of Criminal
Appeal as a consequence. But of course, if you stick to the truth too
closely, you more likely than not will get a boring movie ... As for the
film on hand, what's really commendable is that it makes xenophobia a
theme, back in the day when that was not a given. Other than that though,
the movie's just average TV entertainment, well enough made (apart from a
few to many microphone shadows) to keep one watching, but on a narrative
level, the Sherlock
Holmes-angle is hammered home just a bit too bluntly, while
the actual case doesn't really offer that many hurdles, and certainly
little in Holmesian deduction, and some solutions seem to signal
themselves from miles away or come along too conveniently. It's not at all
an awful movie mind you, just not really memorable either.
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