9/9/2023 0 Comments Film review sherlock holmes![]() ![]() "The visual style – a smoky, greasy, steam-punk rendering of Victorian London, full of soot and guts and bad teeth and period clothes – shows some undeniable flair. "There are worse things than loutish, laddish cool, and as a series of poses and stunts, Sherlock Holmes is intermittently diverting," writes the New York Times' AO Scott. Meanwhile, Holmes's old flame Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams) is also in town and seemingly out to make a fool of our hero. ![]() At the same time he must face up to the loss of his longtime confidant and aide Dr Watson (a much-praised Jude Law), who is about to marry his amour Mary Morstan (Kelly Reilly). ![]() This Holmes is up against the villainous Lord Blackwood (Mark Strong), an apparently immortal pseudo-fascist necromancer who plans to lead England on a mission to reconquer America and eventually the world – presumably a heinous plan cooked up to speed the pulses of our translatlantic cousins. Nevertheless, the critics have just about bought Sherlock Holmes as an intermittently entertaining romp through a stylised Victorian London, thanks mainly to a barnstorming performance by Robert Downey Jr in the title role and its Dan Brown-lite storyline. The film’s biggest success is its evocation of Victorian London, via much location work and CG rendering: here, Ritchie’s grittily romantic view of our city comes into its own, culminating in a delicious climax on the girders of a half-built Tower Bridge.Guy Ritchie's take on Conan Doyle's classic English sleuth is not without its problems: his protagonist does not quite fit the action hero mould into which the much-maligned film-maker has squeezed him, and those who find Ritchie's more laddish tendencies distasteful may be dismayed by the movie's predilection for extreme violence. The banter between Holmes and Watson isn’t as witty as it should be, but the detective’s lone mutterings, especially his deductions, are fun. Ritchie’s ‘Sherlock Holmes’ is effective as a caricatured comedy adventure and shows some fidelity to Arthur Conan Doyle, especially in Downey Jr’s portrayal of the eccentric but cold-hearted Holmes. The villain hangs, but, for Holmes and Watson, this is just the start of a series of fights, rescues, escapes and revelations, all cloaked in creaky supernatural mumbo jumbo. In this early scene, Ritchie’s Holmes reveals himself as a physical titan in a witty interlude in which we witness in slow motion the microscopic details of his plan to incapacitate an assailant by brute force. They discover an aristocrat, Lord Blackwood (Mark Strong), in the middle of a ritualistic murder of a young woman. Plunging into their careers mid-flow, we watch as they confront a conspiracy of national proportions. Here, Robert Downey Jr draws on his wild-eyed side to play the detective, while Jude Law assumes the more sober clothes of his sidekick, Dr Watson. Shed of his tedious infatuation with off-the-peg London gangsters, Ritchie proves a competent teller of the fast-paced, not po-faced yarn. Guy Ritchie the director and Guy Ritchie the screenwriter part ways for this latest spin on the Sherlock Holmes story, and if separation turns into divorce it would be no bad thing, at least on the evidence of this big-hearted, atmospheric entertainment. ![]()
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