A Definitely Interesting Although Overly Long Take On The Famous Detective

Rating: 4/10 (24 September 2011)

Highlighting this adaptation of the character created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle are the performances by the lead actors - Robert Downey, Jr. and Jude Law as Holmes and Watson, respectively. Both were very good and both successfully put their own unique spins on very familiar characters. Downey's Holmes is still a brilliant detective, inexplicably deducing things from the smallest clues available, but in this he's also an action figure, and a fighter, engaging in the public sport of bare knuckle brawling. In short, there's a wee hint of a darker side to the great detective that I've not come across before. Unique though that take on the character may be, I was never really convinced that I liked that take on the character. In some ways it was too unique. You have certain expectations of Sherlock Holmes, and while an action version of the character may be what's needed in a big screen production, it's still a bit jarring. But Downey was excellent in the role. No criticism of him. Law's Watson was also unique. In the stories he's the loyal assistant to Holmes - and sometimes even more brilliant than the detective himself. His brilliance is maintained here, but he's not quite as loyal in this. In fact, he's ready to bail on Holmes; he's engaged and wants out of the partnership; he's ready to move on from the cluttered office he shares with Holmes. There's also more emphasis on Watson's identity as a medical doctor here. Law also worked well in his role, and to me, the differences in the Watson character were less jarring than those in Holmes.
Downey and Law and their characters aside, though, I simply was not taken in by the story, about some secret society and its leader apparently hell bent on taking over first Britain and then the world, using trickery to convince those around them that they possessed some type of supernatural power. The story was long and drawn out, and while interesting at times (and even though it did make effective use of humour throughout) I found it to be inconsistent. I have to say that I was less than enamoured with director Guy Ritchie's repeated use of slow motion to anticipate action moments that were going to happen, only to then repeat those very same action moments in normal time - which dragged this out even more.
In the end, I wasn't really impressed with the movie. Downey and Law I was impressed with, but I found the story to be less than stellar in all honesty. (4/10)