The Spider Woman

Plot synopsis:
Consulting detective Sherlock Holmes fakes his own death in Scotland in order to investigate a number of bizarre apparent suicides that he is convinced are part of an elaborate plot by "a female Moriarty". Returning to his assistant Watson in secret, Holmes notes that all the victims were wealthy gamblers, so disguised as "Rajni Singh", a distinguished Indian officer, he stalks London's gaming clubs.
It is not long before he encounters the villain of the piece, Adrea Spedding. Holmes discovers that she seeks out men short of money, persuades them to pawn their life insurance policies with her accomplices, then kills them. Holmes sets himself up as her next victim, discovering that she uses the deadly spider, Lycosa Carnivora, whose venom causes such excruciating pain that the victims kill themselves. Holmes also finds the footprint of a child nearby.
Searching for evidence Holmes and Watson visit eminent arachnologist Matthew Ordway, who may have supplied the deadly creatures. Holmes soon realizes that the man he is speaking to is an impostor, but the villain makes his escape. Searching the premises, Holmes finds the corpse of the real Ordway, as well as his journals, which allude to something or someone from Central Africa immune to the spider venom. This baffles Holmes until he finds the model skeleton of a child. However, Dr. Watson points out that the relation of the skull and the circumference of the chest prove it is not a child, and Holmes deduces that the Central African thing described in the journal is a pygmy.
Holmes and Watson continue their investigations at a nearby fairground, where Holmes allows himself to fall into the clutches of Spedding and her gang. Bound and gagged, Holmes is tied behind a moving target in a shooting gallery, at which Lestrade and Watson take pot shots with a .22 rifle. However Holmes manages to escape, and Lestrade and the police arrest Spedding, her gang, and the pygmy.

Tags: murder

Review:
This might rate as the most entertaining of all the Basil Rathbone Sherlock Holmes films, which I still think are the best renditions on film of the famous detective.This has a surprising amount of action and is simply a fun story to watch.
Packed into just one hour are such scenes as Holmes faking his death, a near-poisoning of he and Dr. Watson by gas, a strange little boy who hops around a room, tarantulas on the loose, on and on.Nigel Bruce is his normally funny Dr. Watson and Gale Sondergaard makes an excellent villain.
Sherlock Holmes matches wits with THE SPIDER WOMAN, a fiendish femme fatale responsible for a series of ingenious London murders.Holmes & Watson face one of their most dangerous enemies in this highly enjoyable little crime mystery.
The brief running time and abrupt conclusion are unfortunate, and the ultimate reason for all the murders is really not all that exciting, but the vivid characters and dangerous adventure more than compensate for the film's shortcomings.Basil Rathbone & Nigel Bruce remain perfect in their leading roles.
Bumbling Bruce only grows more lovable with each passing film, playing his part with fierce loyalty as well as charming naiveté.Oscar winning actress Gale Sondergaard portrays the title role with deadly feline guile, teasing Holmes the way a cat plays with a mouse.
Back for their recurring roles are Dennis Hoey as dogged Inspector Lestrade and dear Mary Gordon as Mrs. Hudson.This film -- which was based on wisps of plot from Conan Doyle'sThe Final Problem, The Empty House, The Speckled Band, The Sign of Four, and The Devil's Foot -- followed SHERLOCK HOLMES FACES DEATH (1943) and preceded THE SCARLET CLAW (1944).
The 1942-43 Holmes/Watson films are often pathetic nonsense involving Nazi spies and have Holmes dashing all over the place firing guns at all and sundry, which doesn't work at all.Yes, this is wartime, and the targets in the fairground shooting gallery are Hitler, Hirohito and Mussolini, but this is a proper detective story about mysterious murders.It's an amalgam of Conan Doyle's original stories The Sign of Four and The Final Problem rather than a farrago of cod secret agents, and it works pretty well as a mystery.Gale Sondergaard makes a marvellous villain, and plays excellently opposite Rathbone's Holmes.Well worth while.
One of the best in Universal's Sherlock Holmes series, The Spider Woman dispenses, for the most part, with the overt WWII subject matter (which was also reasonably sparse in the previous outing, Sherlock Holmes Faces Death).
Rather than battling Nazi agents, Rathbone's Sherlock is embroiled in a truly Holmesian mystery, surrounding several apparent suicides...which Holmes, naturally (and correctly), deduces to be homicides.Though the opening credits proclaim "Based on a Story by Arthur Conan Doyle," The Spider Woman adapts (quite freely) major incidents from no less than five of Conan Doyle's tales...The Sign of Four, The Speckled Band, The Final Problem, The Empty House (also referenced in Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon), and The Devil's Foot.
False advertising, maybe...but the script (courtesy of Bertram Millhauser) manages to weave them all into a framework that makes for a fun and intriguing mystery.Other assets include the performances, which are better than in some of the earlier films (though Rathbone and Bruce never disappointed), and the more sure-handed guidance of regular directer Roy William Neill...by this time, a vast improvement over the direction in his first Holmes outing, Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon.
The mannerisms, the voice and the screen presence of the great actor combine to create a fantastic representation of the eloquent detective and you really can't imagine anyone but Basil Rathbone playing Sherlock Holmes in these films.
With an involved, detailed mystery and an elegant adversary played by Gale Sondergaard, this is one of the most entertaining features in the Sherlock Holmes series of movies starring Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce.
It also features the usual pleasant camaraderie between Rathbone and Bruce, plus Dennis Hoey as Inspector Lestrade.As "The Spider Woman", Sondergaard creates a memorable opponent for Holmes.
"Spider Woman" finds Basil Rathbone matching wits with the enticing title character, superbly played by the beautiful Gale Sondergaard.
Adrea Spedding (Gale Sondergaard), the evil mastermind of The Spider Woman, concocts a particularly absurd scheme in order to make herself filthy rich: she convinces wealthy men with cash flow problems to use their life insurance policies as collateral against a loan; then she bumps them off, not with anything as simple as a gun or dagger, but by releasing a pygmy into the ventilation ducts where they live, and having him release a poisonous spider into their bedroom while they sleep.
With no clues as to why the men have killed themselves (the obedient spider obviously having wandered back into the vent having done his duty), the press report these mysterious deaths as 'pyjama suicides'.Holmes (Basil Rathbone) naturally suspects otherwise and cooks up with own crazy plan to discover the truth: whilst enjoying a relaxing fishing break in Scotland with trusty sidekick Watson (Nigel Bruce), the great detective fakes his own death, and then adopts a series of silly disguises to investigate the case, soon coming face to face with The Spider Woman, who proves to be every bit as devious and deadly as Holmes' old nemesis Moriarty, but better looking.This preposterous plot makes for one of the most entertaining films in the series, Holmes' sporting patently false facial hair for his roles as a rude postie and a down-on-his luck Indian Rajni Singh, Watson making a complete fool of himself with an eminent entomologist, and Spedding ordering pint-sized Obongo from the Congo, the Prancing Pygmy (Angelo Rossitto, one-half of Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome's Master Blaster) back into his case!
Hoey is always a welcome addition to the cast and he is a good comic relief that takes the pressure off Bruce somewhat.Overall, the plot didn't totally hang together for me and it lacked a little bit of logic as a result of the slightly unusal nature of the murders and the criminals involved but it is still very enjoyable and the conclusion in the fairground is a lot tenser than a B-movie deserves to be!.
Sherlock Holmes encounters his most formidable foe since Professor Moriarty in "The Spider Woman," among the best of Universal's Holmes series.
The fifth in Universal's Holmes series is all about Sherlock Holmes.One key to the film's success is Gale Sondergaard, an Oscar winner for "Anthony Adverse," who is perfect as the spider woman of the title.
Both Rathbone and Nigel Bruce, perhaps challenged by Sondergaard, rise to the occasion and are in top form as Holmes and Watson; the reliable Dennis Hoey and Mary Gordon are back as Inspector Lestrade and Mrs. Hudson, respectively.
Roy William Neill once again helms, and Charles Van Enger, who shot "Sherlock Holmes Faces Death," also returned to film this entry in the series with the appropriate atmosphere.
Stir a witty script with Rathbone and Bruce in fine form, add a clever plot, season with several close brushes with death, garnish with a diabolical villain and the result is "The Spider Woman," a top entry in the Sherlock Holmes series..
One of the best of the Basil Rathbone Sherlock Holmes series at Universal.
It's got many of the trademarks of the series, including the lovable buffoonery from Nigel Bruce's Watson, Holmes in disguises that shouldn't fool anyone, and Dennis Hoey's Inspector Lastrade, always a day late and a clue short on every case.
As the title suggests, this time Holmes has got to do with a TRUE 'spider woman' - not that she bears any resemblance to those not very charming creatures, but she's exactly as dangerous and reckless as them, and even 'works' with them (by the way, she's played by Gale Sondergaard, who specialized in mysterious and sometimes really fatal ladies)...But at the beginning of the story there's a mysterious series of 'pyjama suicides', where quite successful and seemingly happy people suddenly commit suicide in the middle of the night, without leaving even a note behind them; and for solving those very strange 'incidents - which aren't suicides, but MURDERS, as Holmes has already deduced - Holmes goes 'underground' in a very spectacular way.
And there he meets dark, beautiful Adrea Spedding - the 'spider woman'...So, of course, there's no great mystery there; we get to know very soon who's the instigator of those 'suicides', and how they're carried out - but that leads us to REAL, enormously poisonous spiders and other sudden, unexpected dangers and a lot of other features that render this movie REALLY suspenseful!
The Basil Rathbone Sherlock Holmes films are generally good(great in the case of Hound of the Baskervilles, Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Scarlet Claw) films and Rathbone's Holmes is easily the best of the movie incarnations of the characters, second only to Jeremy Brett overall.
While not in the top 3 Rathbone/Holmes entries, The Spider Woman is one of the better and most entertaining films of the series.
The dialogue is both thought-provoking with Holmes and amusing with Watson and Lestrade, while the story is well-paced, suspenseful and easy to follow with a few far-fetched moments(though not enough to harm the film), fun-to-spot references to Sherlock Holmes stories and a tense and eerie climax.
The acting is very good, Gale Sondergaard's beautiful but chillingly and deliciously deadly performance steals the film but Basil Rathbone is still his usual brilliant self and Nigel Bruce(less of a bumbling fool than he can be in the role) and Dennis Hoey provide some amusing moments without jarring.
All in all, an extremely entertaining film, if you love Sherlock Holmes and Rathbone's portrayal you are most likely to really like The Spider Woman.
Sherlock Holmes in The Spider Woman faces a female master criminal, one as Basil Rathbone describes 'as deadly as Moriarty'.
Gale Sondergaard is in the infamous title role and she's got the brain of a Professor Moriarty and the charm of a Mata Hari.In fact as the film begins Holmes and Watson are finally on a long postponed fishing trip in Scotland and they are discussing a series of suicides of wealthy men, men dying with no apparent cause.
Then it's a battle of brains and wits.The Spider Woman is a good if not great Holmes feature totally dominated by Gale Sondergaard's evil character.
Poisonous gases, creepy crawlies, a delectably evil villainess, and a quite wonderful fairground finale, help to make The Spider Woman a very strong entry in the Rathbone/Bruce cannon of Sherlock Holmes pictures.
If anyone unfamiliar with the Basil Rathbone Sherlock Holmes films is looking for a good place to start his cinematic journey, I would exuberantly recommend THE SPIDER WOMAN.
In "The Spider Woman" Rathbone's Holmes is matched against arguably one of the finest actresses of her day, the sadly under- appreciated Gale Sondergaard.
As happened in the case of Basil Rathbone's portrayal of Sherlock Holmes, it seems that Sondergaard apparently played her part too effectively.
"The Spider Woman" is far from the best film of the 1940s, or even the best of the famous Sherlock Holmes series.
The Shortest (61min) of the Basil Rathbone-Nigel Bruce Sherlock Holmes Movies, it is Nonetheless Packed with Odd Characters and some Edgy Violence.
Also, Gale Sondergaard as the "Spider Woman" Adds a bit of Sultry Nefariousness to the Picture.The Actual Spider Murder Attempt on Holmes is Photographed in an Eerie, Realistic Bent of Horror and the Suicides at the Beginning are Violently Graphic for the Time.
There is a lot of Verbal Sparring between Rathbone and Sondergaard and She has a Mute, Hopping, Fly Catcher of a Nephew and Employs a Pygmy.Holmes and Watson Face Death a Number of Times and the Climax at a Carnival is a Standout of a Surreal Suspension of Disbelief.
THE SPIDER WOMAN (Universal, 1943), produced and directed by Roy William Neil, the seventh installment to the "Sherlock Holmes" franchise starring Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce, the fifth for Universal, ranks another agreeable entry as well as one of the shortest (62 minutes) in the series.The story begins with series of "pajama suicides" (spelled "pyjama" in the newspaper clipping montage) in the London district where numerous gamblers are found murdered in their beds.
When a woman asks her husband, Robert, regarding to these reported suicides, "Where is Sherlock Holmes?" the next scene finds Holmes (Basil Rathbone) on a holiday in Scotland accompanied by his colleague, Doctor Watson (Nigel Bruce).
Disguised as a Hindu named Raghni Singh, Holmes encounters the alluring Adrea Spedding (Gale Sondergaard) at the gambling tables, who turns out to be more of a challenge for Holmes than his arch enemy, Professor Moriarty.Though the first in the series to eliminate "Sherlock Holmes" in the opening titles, it's a wonder whether or not the movie was initially distributed as SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE SPIDER WOMAN, considering an obvious inserted title, "The Spider Woman" super imposed over a different background, or possibly shortened prior to its theatrical release?
This seventh entry in the Sherlock Holmes series finds the lovable detective matching wits with an audacious and most deadly villainess, the titular Spider Woman, and her eight-legged pets.
This film, "The Spider Woman," is based on the Conan Doyle story "The Speckled Band." Holmes fakes his death in order to investigate some diabolical murders that appear to look like suicides, hoping to force the criminals out into the open.
it pits sherlock holmes against a woman with a deadly spider who commits these so called "pajama suicides." gale soundergard plays a great role in this movie, marking her down in the history books.
The fantastic Sherlock Holmes has solved yet another murdering mystery, in a nice '40's atmosphere and with fantastic performances by the cast especially Basil Rathbone as the legendary well known Sherlock Holmes is fantastic.It's a shame you can see that this movie has been based on a book.
As for me, I'm a HUGE fan of the stories but watch these Universal films and try to pretend the characters are NOT Holmes and Watson...just two dummies.In "The Spider Woman", once again the story seems to have been written by a lemur.
Here, Sherlock Holmes(played by Basil Rathbone) and Doctor Watson(played by Nigel Bruce) investigate mysterious deaths that the press have called "The Pajama Suicides", but are really cunning murders committed by the Spider Woman(played by Gale Sondergaard), whom Holmes calls a female Moriarty, who uses spiders to bite the men in their sleep, the venom driving them to suicide in a plot to collect on their life insurance policies.
Spider Woman, The (1944) *** (out of 4) Fast paced fifth entry in the series has London being hit with a wide range of suicides but Holmes (Basil Rathbone) thinks that murder is behind it.
I found Sondergaard to be good in her role but I wouldn't say she delivered a great performance, although she's certainly better here than the strange The Spider Woman Strikes Back, which was released two years after this.
As the villain of the piece and Spider Woman of the title, Gale Sondergaard actually brings an element of class and sophistication to the role, proving a formidable adversary along with her retinue of henchmen and underlings.The carnival atmosphere and shooting gallery location of the film's finale provides one of the more unusual backdrops to solving the mystery of the 'pyjama' murders (not a mis-spelling, I'm using the film's version), as Holmes thwarts the villains by escaping his bonds while the authorities descend to put away the Spider Woman once and for all.
Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce are excellent as always, but the film belongs to Sondergaard, who would play many similar characters, but none as deliciously deadly as this one.
When a wave of apparently inexplicable suicides strikes London, Sherlock Holmes sniffs a more sinister plot and uncovers a diabolical insurance scam masterminded by a femme fatale, Adrea Spedding, also known as The Spider Woman This one is my personal favourite of the fourteen Basil Rathbone-Nigel Bruce Sherlock Holmes quickies of the forties, not least for the fabulous performance by the beautiful, charming, wildly talented Sondergaard as the arch-villainess.
Followed by a curio, The Spider Woman Strikes Back, which is a horror quickie with no relation to the Holmes movie, but also features Sondergaard as the villain.
The Spider Woman sees the worlds foremost detective Sherlock Holmes (Basil Rathbone) again trying to solve a baffling case.
The general public demand Sherlock Holmes investigate, however at this point in time Holmes is visiting Scotland with his trusty assistant Dr. Watson (Nigel Bruce) for a bit of fishing which also provides the perfect opportunity for him to fake his own death, Holmes suspects that a woman is behind the supposed suicides & that with himself appearing to be dead she will drop her guard.
Holmes feels he is on the right track especially when an attempt is made on his life using the world's deadliest spider...Produced & directed by Roy William Neill The Spider Woman was the seventh in a series of fourteen Sherlock Holmes films staring the duo of Rathbone & Bruce as Holmes & Watson.
Sondergaard makes a good villain & is quite nice to look at.The Spider Woman is a good Holmes murder mystery & if you like these types of films then I have no hesitation to recommend it.
Our hero Sherlock Holmes, Basil Rathbone, seems to want nothing to do with this in taking a vacation in jolly old Scotland to go fishing with his good friend and colleague, as well as room-mate, Dr. Watson, Nigel Bruce, while all his jumping, out of windows or in front of cars and trucks, is gong on.Within the first five minutes into the movie Sherlock gets a dizzy spell and falls off a cliff to his "death" in the stream below.
The Spider Woman is another fun and enjoyable outing for Sherlock Holmes and his sidekick Dr. Watson.