Climbing Higher Pictures

There was a time when a modern retelling of a classic literary figure wouldn’t spark quite as much controversy as it does now. From a series of action and fighting oriented trailers, the marketing team has attempted to convince contemporary America that a boxing, swordfighting, and drinking Sherlock Holmes is the man behind the legend. Tack on Guy Ritchie, British director of such modern crime and gangster fare as Snatch and Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels and you have, what could be, a recipe for disaster. Don’t be too quick to discount the considerable talents of Robert Downey Jr. as the titular slueth and the always charismatic Jude Law as his trusty companion though, as both have plenty of star power to raise a mediocre project into the stratosphere. So which is it? The Sherlock Holmes movie you’ve been waiting for, or a pale imitation of the once great mastermind? Find out below:

Sherlock Holmes Review

By Ryan Hamelin

Movie Grade: A-

I know what you’re thinking. What’s with all the fisticuffs involving the world’s most famous detective in Guy Ritchie’s new Sherlock Holmes movie? Is this even a Sherlock Holmes movie, thinking, I guess, that such a film has to be boring and brain teasing as opposed to brawny and energetic? Since when does Watson not look like an overweight simpleton, pawing at Holmes’s coat and waiting for the sleuth to expertly deduce the next stage in the case? The answer to all these questions involves a creative team that knows what it takes to make a wonderfully fun an inventive piece of cinema, and a lot of that happens to do with sprucing up and, dare I say it, improving on the shadows of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Holmes which have appeared in adaptation after adaptation over the years. Make no mistake, this is a Sherlock Holmes movie, and the modern sensibility may just be the thing that pushes this one into the status of the “Best Sherlock Holmes Movie” Hollywood has ever produced. What works you ask? Let me count the ways.

Firstly, casting. Robert Downey Jr. is a phenomenal character actor, the only type of performer who could nail the spirit of Doyle’s original flawed mastermind while still proving himself charming enough to carry a film as a leading man. Jude Law is having a blast as Watson, and apart from a lack of physical continuity to the classic image of Holmes’s sidekick you’re used to, brings a level of depth and empathy to the dynamic duo that keeps Robert Downey Jr.’s off-the-wall performance grounded. Rachel McAdams does great work as the master thief Irene Adler, and despite being far younger in relation to Holmes than would appear to work, shares a great chemistry with Downey that also manages to balance the scales of their scenes together. Watching Downey play off of the two of them is half the fun of the film, and luckily they avoid spending too long separated, allowing the lighting fast dialogue to ramp up from sequence to sequence. Mark Strong is also great in his villainous role of Lord Blackwood, but I’ll get back to him in a moment.

Secondly, script. Cracking the nut which is a Sherlock Holmes adaptation is no mean feat, and it starts with one of the ballsier moves I’ve seen a writing team make with a big franchise to date, it’s not an origin story. That’s right, this isn’t a How-Watson-Met-Sherlock-And-Went-On-Their-First-Adventure lark, and the opening throws you right into the thick of it, the way a good story should. In other news, the dialogue is delivered at a mile a minute. This is disorienting at first, and you may miss the first few minutes out of sheer shock, but the fact that these two characters know each other so well means the lines fly fast and furiously. The accents are serviceable as well, nothing to write home about, but nothing that’ll take you out of the film either. The clichéd scenes know they’re cliché and have fun with the concept, using the classical narrative structure as a jumping off point for plenty of unexpected high jinx.

The kicker, and the most impressive part of the entire script, is the handling of the exposition. Moments when a character explains the plot can be the death knell of a film, and when you’re making a Sherlock Holmes movie, you have to be prepared to handle such sequences with gusto. Luckily they do, and the dialogue is particularly impressive in these moments of intense exposition, as they end up being just as enjoyable as the action-oriented stuff which preceded it. While not an origin story, the narrative does leave a lot of room free for future chapters, namely in the form of a certain arch-nemesis, the chalk-on-the-collar, (he’s a professor, you see) darkness enshrouded Moriarty. A big cameo reveal of him in this film would have certainly kicked the ending up a notch, but as far as I know he remains uncast, despite rumors of Brad Pitt’s involvement to the contrary. The problem is that you spend much of the movie hoping that he’ll factor in somehow, and the tease almost undermines the villainy of Mark Strong, who would have made a great Moriarty, but has to be content with an amalgamation of several other Holmes adversaries.

The flair for the theatrical within Lord Blackwood feels awfully inspired by the director himself, Mr. Guy Ritchie, who hadn’t made a decent movie in a long while before returning to form with 08’s Rock’N’Rolla. Should this franchise take off, which I have no doubt it will, the big question will be who they manage to get for the bad guy role, and whether he’ll be able to hold his own against Downey with a whole movie of set-up between them. For an opening salvo, this is quite the auspicious start, and between Holmes and Avatar, you’ll be loving fun Hollywood spectacle all over again by the time Christmas is over. Pure entertainment ladies and gentlemen, it’s not nearly as elementary as one might think.