Sherlock Holmes for the brain-dead

Rating: 4/10 (30 December 2009)

By-passing the outraged and ignorant who seem to think the only Holmes is the one played so well by Basil Rathbone many years ago, this movie nonetheless lacks a great deal of entertainment value, and treats the audience as if they were dim-wits. Having said that, I am delighted that Watson is portrayed as something other than a bumbling foil, but more of Jude Law's role later.
The quantity of expository dialog grates after the first few minutes, and the attempts to show Holmes' thinking by using voice-overs becomes tedious. There are better ways of doing this, but if you're pitching at a CSI-style audience (as a retired forensic scientist, I can assure you all that we do not lean on our instruments, and discuss the basic principles of their function with each other), then perhaps the laziness or ineptness of the script-writer(s) is understandable.
Downey appears to be reprising his role as Stark in Iron Man, but with Jude Law as his near-constant companion just to provide some modicum of variety.
The action comes quickly, and with little let-up, but this is no handicap to the enjoyment. The somewhat washed-out colors and the fact the scenes are almost always in dim locations means much of the movement is hard to discern in the gloom and surely action needs to be clearly seen? The sets themselves show obvious artifacts of cgi and after pieces like Gladiator and more recently the brilliant Avatar, the audience is left feeling either budgets prevented the job being done properly or more dangerously, that the studio didn't care, thinking the drawcards of Holmes, Downey and Law were sufficient.
Though Downey tries hard, it is Law who comes across as more convincing and is the focus of attention whenever the two are together. His portrayal is the highlight of the movie. The lowlight is, obviously, the handcuffed Downey, naked on the bed with only a teddy-bear for modesty. This is US-sit-com stuff and the fact such a tired, clichéd scene features heavily in previews shows the utter lack of imagination the scriptwriters put into their work. And of course, the giant who wreaks mayhem and is near-invincible has been done to death. Is it such a crime to bring something new to the audience?
The climax was both predictable and tedious, but thankfully has one recommendation: it showed the end was near. There are many movies where the talents of the cast are wasted. Sadly, this can so easily be added to the list, and must be done so immediately.