The introductory credits state that the movie is adapted from Conan Doyle's "The Final problem" and 'The Empty House' stories. Kathleen Adair has called her friend Dr. Watson because she is concerned about her brother Ronnie. Ronnie plays high stakes bridge and Kathleen thinks he so consistently wins because he cheats. And he does. Unfortunately, Professor Moriarty has proof that Ronnie cheats and blackmails him. How this is related to the murder of a bank watchman makes for an interesting tale. The film starts off slowly but picks up considerably once Holmes appears. Wontner perfectly presents Holmes' droll sense of humor and occasional edginess. Fleming as Dr. Watson does a solid job; his best scene is where tries to use Holmes' methods to describe a man based solely on the man's hat. He amusingly completely fails. An unexpected treat in this movie was the portrayal of Mrs. Hudson as a feisty cockney. It was both refreshing and believable. An entertaining movie that will be especially interesting to Holmes' fans.

The Fatal Hour is truly a hidden gem of a film. Authur Wotner accentuates the cerebral and neurotic sides of Sherlock Holmes to excellent effect here. Fleming, as Dr. Watson, plays the perfect straight man to the eccentric Holmes. This film also demonstrates some early artistic film touches such as the fantastically dark and shadowed opening scene and claustrophobic interior shots which work to emphasize Holmes's "armchair-detective" style. The one serious fault I had with the film was the underwhelming first encounter between Moriarty and Holmes; the scene lacks the tension one would envision between the two. But even with this disappointing scene, I found the film a real treasure. I discovered this movie on the Hulu channel American Pop Classics, and they had some other really wonderful and obscure movies as well:

http://www.hulu.com/studio/American-pop-classics?sort=name