The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970)

Robert Stephens: Sherlock Holmes

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Quotes 

• Watson : Holmes, let me ask you a question. I hope I'm not being presumptuous, but... there *have* been women in your life, haven't there?

  Holmes : The answer is yes...

  Watson : [Watson breathes a sigh of relief] 

  Holmes : ...You're being presumptuous. Good night.

• Holmes : [after he learns Madame Petrova wants him to impregnate her]  This is all very flattering, but surely there are other men, better men.

  Nikolai Rogozhin : To tell truth, you were not the first choice. We considered Russian writer, Tolstoy.

  Holmes : Oh, that's more like it. The man's a genius.

  Nikolai Rogozhin : Too old. Then we considered philosopher, Nietzsche.

  Holmes : Well, absolutely first-rate mind.

  Nikolai Rogozhin : Uh-uh. Too German. Then we considered Tchaikovsky.

  Holmes : Oh, you couldn't go wrong with Tchaikovsky.

  Nikolai Rogozhin : We could, and we did. It was catastrophe.

  Holmes : Why?

  Nikolai Rogozhin : You don't know? Because Tchaikovsky, how shall I put it? Women not his glass of tea.

• Watson : [the doorbell rings]  Were you expecting someone?

  Holmes : Not at this time of night.

  Watson : Perhaps Mrs Hudson is entertaining.

  Holmes : I've never found her so.

• [Holmes is about to inject cocaine] 

  Watson : Where's your self-control?

  Holmes : Fair question.

  Watson : Aren't you ashamed of yourself?

  Holmes : Thoroughly. This will take care of it.

• Holmes : We all have occasional failures. Fortunately Dr. Watson never writes about mine.

• [about Madame Petrova] 

  Watson : They say twelve men have died for her.

  Holmes : Really?

  Watson : Six commited suicide, four were killed in duels and one fell out of the gallery of the Vienna Opera House.

  Holmes : That's only eleven.

  Watson : The man who fell from the gallery landed on top of another man in the orchestra.

  Holmes : That makes an even dozen... in a messy sort of way.

• Holmes : [talking about women]  Take my fiancée, for instance.

  Ilse von Hoffmanstal, aka Gabrielle Valladon : Your... fiancée?

  Holmes : Mmmm, she was the daughter of my violin teacher. We were engaged to be married, the invitations were out, I was being fitted for a tailcoat, and 24 hours before the wedding, she died of influenza. It just proves my contention that women are unreliable and not to be trusted.

• Holmes : Look at this: an urgent appeal to find some missing midgets.

  Watson : Did you say "midgets"?

  Holmes : Six of them, the Tumbling Piccolos, an acrobatic act of some circus.

  Watson : [Reading the letter]  Disappeared between London and Bristol. Well don't you find that intriguing?

  Holmes : Extremely so. You see, they're not only midgets, but also anarchists.

  Watson : Anarchists?

  Holmes : By now, they have been smuggled to Vienna, dressed as little girls in organdy pinafores. They are to greet the czar of all the Russias when he arrives at the railway station. They will be carrying bouquets of flowers, and concealed in each bouquet will be a bomb with a lit fuse.

  Watson : [Breathlessly]  You really think so?

  Holmes : Not at all. The circus owner offers me five pounds for my services. That's not even a pound a midget. So obviously, he's a stingy blighter and the little chaps simply ran off to join another circus.

  Watson : [Crestfallen]  It sounded so promising.

• Watson : You call yourself logical? You're the least logical man I know.

  Holmes : Am I?

  Watson : How can you say it's a figment of my imagination when for years you've been saying I have no imagination whatsoever?

• Holmes : Mrs Hudson! MRS HUDSON!

  Mrs. Hudson : Yes? What is it? What have I done now?

  Holmes : There is something missing from my desk!

  Mrs. Hudson : Missing?

  Holmes : Something very crucial!

  Mrs. Hudson : What?

  Holmes : Dust! You have been tidying up against my explicit orders!

  Mrs. Hudson : Oh look, I made sure I hadn't disturbed anything.

  Holmes : Dust, Mrs Hudson, is an essential part of my filing system. By the thickness of it I can date any document immediately.

  Mrs. Hudson : Well, some of the dust was THIS thick.

  Holmes : That would be March 1883.

• Holmes : Some of us are cursed with memories like flypaper - and stuck there is a staggering amount of miscellaneous data, mostly useless.

• Nikolai Rogozhin : Mr. Holmes, what you have seen tonight is last, and positively final performance of Madame Petrova. She is retiring.

  Holmes : What a shame.

  Nikolai Rogozhin : She's been dancing since she was three years old, and after all, she is now thirty-eight.

  Holmes : I must say, she doesn't *look* thirty-eight.

  Nikolai Rogozhin : That is because she is forty-nine.

• Holmes : [Discussing Watson's portrayal of Holmes in 'Strand' Magazine]  I don't dislike women, I merely distrust them. The twinkle in the eye and the arsenic in the soup...

  Watson : You see it's touches like that which make you colourful.

  Holmes : Lurid, more like!

• Holmes : You've painted me as a hopeless dope addict just because I occasionally take a five-percent solution of cocaine.

  Watson : A *seven-percent* solution...

  Holmes : Five percent. Don't you think I'm aware you've been diluting it behind my back?

  Watson : As a doctor, as well as your friend, I strongly disapprove of this insidious habit of yours.

  Holmes : My dear friend, as well as my dear doctor, I only resort to narcotics when I'm suffering from acute boredom, when there are no interesting cases to engage my mind.

• Mycroft Holmes : And this is my brother Sherlock, ma'am.

  Queen Victoria : Ah, yes! Sherlock Holmes. We have been following your exploits with great interest.

  Holmes : Thank you, ma'am.

  Queen Victoria : Are you engaged in one of your fascinating cases at the moment?

  Holmes : In a manner of speaking, ma'am.

  Queen Victoria : When can we expect to read Dr Watson's account of the case?

  Holmes : I hope never, ma'am. It has not been one of my more successful endeavours.

• Holmes : Criminals are as unpredictable as head colds. You never know when you're going to catch one.

• Holmes : Madame must not be too hasty. She must remember that I am an Englishman.

  Nikolai Rogozhin : So?

  Holmes : You know what they say about us: if there's one thing more deplorable than our cooking, it's our lovemaking. We are not the most romantic of people.

  Nikolai Rogozhin : Perfect! We don't want sentimental idiots, falling in love, committing suicide. One week in Venice with Madame, she goes back to St. Petersburg with baby, you go back to London with fiddle.

• Holmes : From the sound of your footsteps, I gathered that you were not in a particularly amiable mood.

• Holmes : Watson, this is a very small flat. We don't want to clutter it up with women!

• Holmes : Actually, I don't dislike women... I merely distrust them.

• Holmes : Believe me Madam, I would rather disappoint you now, than in a gondola in venice!