Sherlock Holmes
Written by Michael Robert Johnson, Anthony Peckham, and Simon Kinberg, from a story by Lionel Wigram and Michael Robert Johnson (based on characters created by Arthur Conan Doyle)
Directed by Guy Ritchie
Starring Robert Downey Jr., Jude Law, Eddie Marsan, Rachel McAdams, Mark Strong
Warning: this review does contain some spoilers. There are surprises and twists in the movie, and if you’d rather not know them going on, bookmark this page, and then read it after you see the film.
I went in expecting a steampunk adventure retelling of the hoary Sherlock Holmes stories, and dreading Robert Downey Jr. as the calm, cool, cerebral Holmes. Fortunately, I was able to put aside my expectations, and instead enjoy the movie that was presented. It was great.
Sherlock Holmes is not a steampunk film per se, but it is informed by the steampunk ethos: the sets, setting, and styling are wonderful, late-Victorian era all the way (but slightly modernized for modern sensibilities). The maguffin of the film actually does turn out to be a somewhat advanced piece of technology (the actual steampunk), but by the time we get there, it doesn’t really matter what it is. Instead, we have a somewhat modern Holmes doing what he does best: being interested in everything, more observant than the average man, and fallible in his vices and quirks.
Holmes is a tortured genius. He can think faster than the average man, notice clues the average man will miss completely, and make brilliant intuitive leaps off the barest of precipices into the answer without breaking a sweat. But he’s tortured because he wants to find cases which actually use his talents, which challenge him, and in which he might actually lose. So he sits at home (in a beautifully rendered 221B Baker Street) toying with his myriad interests (designing a silencer for a pistol, anesthetizing his faithful dog, playing his violin, and catching wasps one at a time to test theories on a jarful of them). He’s neither dapper nor classy; he’s rumpled, but in the manner of Einstein, rather than Colombo. But he’s an Einstein who can through a punch, execute a perfect jujitsu move, and take down his opponent every time. A fight scene early in the movie, echoed later in a boxing ring, is used to interesting effect to show just how quickly and precisely Holmes’s mind works: it is these fights—far more than the only-hinted-at sex (the most nudity we get is Holmes’s chest as he’s tied to a bed)—that won the movie its PG-13 rating.
In short, this is not precisely Arthur Conan Doyle’s Holmes. He isn’t Basil Rathbone, and he isn’t Jeremy Brett. And you know that early on, because there isn’t a deerstalker hat in sight. But you know what? That’s okay. Rathbone’s Holmes operated in several different times and places, and Downey is making his mark as a new Holmes. A pretty good one, too.
Holmes isn’t in the world alone: he’s got his faithful sidekick, war veteran Dr. Watson (Jude Law); originally the chronicler of the stories, there’s a hint that he’s doing the same here. But there’s more to Watson than simply asking Holmes leading questions and writing stories: Watson can act, think, and move, too. And like any fully fleshed out character, he is both three-dimensional and flawed. A subplot in the current movie is Watson’s engagement to the winsome Mary Morstan (Kelly Reilly). Watson will be moving out of Baker Street any day, and Holmes dreads the departure of touchstone to the real world. So much so, in fact, that at a polite dinner, Holmes proceeds to insult both Watson and Mary, in hopes of driving them apart (he does not succeed). Holmes and Watson have their disagreements and fights, but they’re almost telepathic with one another; the true measure of their friendship. It’s played to good effect.
So, the movie opens with the police on the hunt in London (cue wonderfully rendered horses clattering on cobblestones, beautifully detailed narrow streets, and too loud music—the music does a great job as an unseen character, but is too loud throughout the film). Cut to: two men entering a catacomb, coming upon a dark ritual in progress, and stopping the proceedings moments before a beautiful young woman is to be sacrificed. And then enter the police, grumpily cleaning up after Homes and Watson have caused havoc in their two-on-many melee and won the day. This Holmes and Watson are the Mike Lowry and Marcus Burnett of Bad Boys, the Tango and Cash of Tango and Cash. So why does this erratic polymath of a genius work with the London Police Department? For the same reason Lowry and Tango work with theirs: because they get off on it, because it makes great use of their skills, and because they’re better at it than anyone else.
Holmes and Watson catch the serial murderer, Lord Blackwood (Mark Strong). But there’s more, much more, to this case. Enough to interest Holmes back out of his hermit’s existence upstairs in Mrs. Hudson’s (Geraldine James) place. It’s not just murder, it’s not just sinister characters in dark shadows. Apparently, there’s death and resurrection, black magic, and shadowy secret societies intent on world domination. Holmes actually meets the secret society, when his presence is “requested”, and he is taken on a blindfolded journey to the headquarters. Unfortunately for the society, Holmes is an observant genius (think of the Bishop-Whistler combination in Sneakers: “What did you hear?” Holmes heard the noises, smelled the smells, and knew what it all meant). The society wants to put a hit out on an apparently risen-from-the-grave bad boy, and while Holmes is willing to take the case, he’s unwilling to work for them. No matter. The result is all that counts.
Oh, and there’s also sexual temptation, in the person of Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams). Adler is a bit character in one of the original Holmes stories, fleshed out here into a globe-trotting thief, the only woman ever to best Holmes, and the object of his hate and desire. They’re very much yin and yang. Now, she’s back in Holmes’s life, but taking orders from a man in the shadows, someone she fears. Someone who’s out to get Holmes.
Gruesome deaths, death-defying stunts (a climactic fight scene atop the under-construction Tower Bridge is gorgeous, if a bit overplayed), seemingly meaningless clues all pasted together by Holmes to get to the root of the mysteries (here the film was a little thin: Holmes drew too many conclusions from microscopic hints, when a little more deduction would have been welcome to give the viewer a chance to work with Holmes, rather than merely being awed by his brilliance), and a (by this time) almost small machine set to change the course of England (and the world)’s history make from a slam-bang action film that is obviously setting the stage for a new series, a Victorian James Bond.
While it was a conscious decision to make this an action film, I still think there was a wee bit too much emphasis on the action, to the detriment of the deduction, reasoning, and problem solving that are hallmarks of Sherlock Holmes, and that were present. But I enjoyed the film, and came away from it satisfied and pleased at the potential for a sequel.