Not as good as the first, but very entertaining

Rating: 7/10 (4 January 2012)

I, as a fan of Sherlock Holmes and of the portrayals given by Basil Rathbone and Jeremy Brett, personally loved the first Sherlock Holmes, it was fun, stylish and clever, with impeccably matched leads and a good villain, even with moments of annoying slow-motion, things getting convoluted and draggy in the second hour and Rachel McAdams.
Although the trailers suggested otherwise, I very much enjoyed this sequel. While there are a few improvements to the first film, it is overall not as good. My problems with the film come from the eventually annoying slow-motion in every fight sequence, it was fine at first but after a while it was overkill. I also felt there were too many characters some of whom don't have much time to develop, and instead are either come and go or blink and you'll miss. Lastly, the last forty-five minutes or so felt-like the first-rather sluggish in the pacing.
However, the film still looks wonderful, with the sets especially absolutely spectacular and a lot of effort is done into making the atmosphere evocative. The cinematography and lighting are also very good, with the lighting in particular giving some scenes a suitably haunting look. The music score is rousing, Guy Ritchie's direction is more efficient this time around, the first hour and a quarter or so goes at a cracking pace and more than makes up for the rather duller half and the dialogue especially with Holmes crackles.
Despite some of my criticisms, there were a couple of improvements. One was Noomi Rapace, whose appearance and style is much more suited to the period, McAdams as Irene gave it her all in the first but I sometimes found her hair and the way the character dressed jarring. Two is that apart from the draggy last act the story this time around is much more involving and contains much more going on to compel the viewer, the first was generally a great idea and was fun but got a little confusing by the end. Lastly, Jared Harris as Moriaty, Mark Strong was good but Moriaty as a whole is a more interesting villain, and I loved how cunning yet smooth Harris' performance was.
Not to mention Stephen Fry as Mycroft, a wonderful and very thoughtful performance in my view, and he even gets his own nude scene. In fact all the cast bring a lot of gusto to the roles even the sidelined(personally I found this a wise move) McAdams. I do wish though there was more of Eddie Marsan as Lestrade, his ineptness is such a great contrast to Holmes' more clever and inquisitive approach and I would have loved to have seen that come through more. Robert Downey Jnr once again is a very charismatic Holmes, and Jude Law as the more authoritative and composed character of Watson is also perfect. Again they are impeccably matched and work wonderfully together.
All in all, I found it very entertaining. Although there are a few things I preferred here, I did prefer the original, but this sequel compared to the film the trailers made it look is equally worthy. 7/10 Bethany Cox