Possibly the most faithful adaption so far!

Rating: 8/10 (10 January 2010)

Having read most (even if not all) of the original stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and having winced through the years at all the different adaptations of the stories into a visual medium I was very sceptic at first, when I heard and read about this movie. But since I'm a big fan of the original Sherlock Holmes I thought I'd give them at least one chance. And they surely deserved it. This movie is possibly the most faithful adaptation of Doyle's writing to film so far. Ironically the things that most people will go "Hey, that's not how Doyle wrote it!" is actually just as he wrote them. They've chosen to show sides of Holmes that have been ignored before. Doyle wrote Mr Holmes as an eccentric, drug abusing, violin playing, unpleasant fighter, and they've chosen to let him be that man. Another thing I was pleasantly surprised at was how, untypical of modern day movie-making, they did Dr Watson justice. Instead of, as so many earlier versions have, portray him as a stumbling, daft fool and comical sidekick (if it's not Watson who is incorrectly used as a comical sidekick it's Gimli or Ron Weasley) he is allowed to be smart and driven by curiosity and lust for adventure.
Finally they also manage to capture the dirty, early twentieth century London well. Costumes are well done, apart from the cleavage on the ladies which is a bit too modern, and Zimmer's music mixed with the occasional old folksong works fine too.
I warmly recommend this movie to anyone who is a fan of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, and to everyone else too of course. I will myself return to the theatre to watch it again.