Hans Albers and Heinz Rühmann stop a train and board it. Albers is wearing a checked coat and a deerstalker, and Rühmann is carrying a violin case. They are recognized by the train's staff as Sherlock Holmes and Watson, though they insist on being called Flint and MacPherson. A couple of suspicious characters flee the train, leaving their baggage. The two men interrogate two sisters, Marieluise Claudius and Hansi Knoteck, who think they are thieves, but the men leave their compartment. The men get off in town and head over to a grand hotel, discussing the techniques of their impostures. They are recognized as Holmes & Watson. When the trunks abandoned by the fleeing men arrive as their trunks, they discover hundreds of thousands of francs, which they hide. They are summoned to police headquarters, where they are asked to investigate the theft of rare stamps. They proceed to do so with apparent confidence. Who are they? Are they tricksters attempting to mulct people seeking the help of the Great Detective? Just taking advantage of credulity for free room and board? Why do they go ahead with the investigations, acting as if they know what they are doing, even though they are clearly not Homes and Watson.
It's fast-paced, it's fun, and it's a little bit mysterious too, rolling right along under the direction of Karl Hartl, with a plot that suggests Emil and the Detectives. Clearly not every German movie in 1937 was intended as propaganda. Some were intended to please an audience looking for a good time, and this is one of them.
