Sherlock Holmes Review

A recent trip to London and a visit to the Sherlock Holmes Museum combined with the new show, Elementary, caused me to want to wach these movies again.  I knew I already liked it from the first time.  I wasn't surprised because I do like most of what I see from Guy Ritchie.  I always like the lighting and cinematography in his movies.  Normally, I am not a huge fan of slow motion action but, for the most part, in this movie, he limits it to what is going on in Holmes' head before he actually engages his opponent in a fight.  So it actually is used very well to show how Holmes can predict how things are going to play out.

The best part of this movie is the dynamic between Robert Downey Jr and Jude Law.  Both are fine actors to begin with.  Downey was basically born to play the over confident jackass and his portrayal of Holmes is basically Tony Stark in Victorian England.  But he does it well.  Law plays the frustrated Watson to a T.  And while he can carry a film on his own normally, he is a great David Spade to Downey's Chris Farley (or any other movie duo you can think of).  Their timing and chemistry is some of the best you will see.

The only real problem with this movie is that the story is a bit convoluted and hard to follow sometimes.  This is often true of detective/mystery films because they have a very finite amount of time to show you the things you came to see (action) while still making the story tight with its twists.  So the viewer really has to accept that there will be confusion for some time but it will all make sense as long as you remember all the stuff that has gone on along the way.

After my trip to London, I did notice a few other problems with how they worked through the city and portrayed it.  First, the Boudicca statue on the North end of the Westminster Bridge wasn't erected until 1902 and this takes place well before that due to the construction of Tower Bridge.  Also, the characters would have to have the speed of the Flash to get from parliament to Tower Bridge through the sewers in the time that they did.  But those are small continuity errors that happen in every movie and are largely ignored for dramatic effect.

See it.  It is a fast paced and very well acted detective tale that keeps you intrigued even if a little confused as well.