Robert Downey Jr. as Sherlock Holmes

Cafe Society
1

I just watched the 2009 Guy Ritchie-directed Sherlock Holmes on my local cable’s Movies On Demand service. I had a Saturday evening to kill, and as much of a Sherlock Holmes fan as I am, I was fully prepared to turn off my brain and my cynicism and just enjoy the ride. I knew they had actioned it up, and that it would be a glitzy, effects-laden film. I just sort of assumed it would end up being pretty trashy and dumb, but probably enjoyable on a pure ooh-aah level.

I should have had more faith. Instead, I ended up loving it, and thinking that Downey’s Sherlock was probably the most faithful, nuanced portrayal I’d ever seen. He was both arrogant and loyal to Watson (who, portrayed by Jude Law, was a great character as well). He was a drug-addled, depressive slob with a penchant for participating in underground boxing matches. He was also ingeniously deductive, and stunningly brilliant. Downey is a smart guy, and he delivered his lines with just the right snap of arrogance, impatience, and utter charm.

It’s funny. Even though I am familiar with Arthur Conan Doyle’s more rough-and-tumble Holmes, I fully expected any homage in the film to be in the form of an homage to an earlier, classic portrayal (like, say, Basil Rathbone), because, hey, when most people think of Sherlock Holmes, Rathbone is the image that pops to mind. The fact that they actually went back to the source material for the character, well, I thought it was stunning. Kudos to Ritchie for doing it that way, too. The original Holmes, who ju-jitsued Moriarty’s ass off the waterfall and who pounded McMurdo into a bloody pulp in bare-knuckles boxing, was much more interesting and fun than Holmes as a prissy, stuffy neat-freak who was above reproach (love you, Basil. Seriously.) No meerschaum, and no deer-hunter cap in evidence, thank God.

More things I loved:

  1. The tips-o’-the-hat to all the Sherlock Holmes lore. The master of disguises. The cocaine in the form of “eye medicine”. The fact that Holmes does his best thinking while smoking. Watson’s fundamental competence (which is something lacking in almost every other adaptation), different from Holmes’s, but complementary. The improbable, but wildly fun, leaps of deduction that made Holmes the all-time greatest detective. I also loved the violin-and-flies homage to The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.

  2. Guy Ritchie is one hell of a director. The film remained snappy and entertaining throughout. It never really lagged. The cinematography and effects were gorgeous. Just spectacular, really.

  3. Jude Law and Robert Downey, Jr. have great chemistry with each other. Their Watson and Holmes were hilarious, and you could believe in the slightly dysfunctional relationship.

  4. The film’s baddie, Lord Blackwood, was murderous, cold-blooded, brooding, and very effective (even if the actor does look a lot like Andy Garcia).

I do kind of wish Lestrade hadn’t been a doofus. He wasn’t a bumbling idiot who couldn’t pronounce “catatonic” in the originals. And for all that Rachel McAdams contributed to the movie as Irene Adler, she might as well have been left out.

But overall, bring on the sequels! Well done!

2

I liked it, but [spoiler]I thought the boxing match was waaaay over the top and a little too “I’M SO HARDCORE!!!”. There are other ways to imply Holmes could handle himself physically without going the cage fighter route. Watson as a competent sidekick was much truer to the books, and I liked that as well. The police as cowardly idiots in the first half was a bit overdone. I thought the electric prod fight with the big guy and ship sinking setup was fantastic.

Agree about the Irene Adler insertion. They had (IMO) zero chemistry and the character did not bring anything to the movie. Their scenes just played too slapstick cute/stupid for my taste. [/spoiler]

3

Yeah, I enjoyed Downey’s take on it as well. Also, it’s the first movie I’ve seen Jude Law in where I didn’t thoroughly hate his character. I don’t care for Jude Law at all, anyway, and he keeps playing characters I dislike as well, but…He did good, here. I enjoyed this Holmes/Watson pairing, and would like to see more.

4

I’m not quite as enthusiastic about the movie as you are, but I thought it was pretty good and in its own way fairly faithful to the original stories. I also thought both Robert Downey, Jr. and Jude Law were great.

I do think Rachel McAdams was miscast and that the Irene Adler character was largely wasted. I also would have enjoyed it more if some of the action sequences had been left out, but that’s because I personally tend to find action scenes boring.

5

[spoiler]But Holmes WAS a cage fighter, according to Doyle! The big lug he was fighting was never named in the movie, but according to the cast list, he was supposed to be McMurdo, from The Sign of the Four. That was a detail I absolutely loved. Here’s a bit of dialogue from Doyle’s original, recalling a prize-fight:

[/spoiler]

6

Call me conservative, but I think Sherlock Holmes begins and ends with Jeremy Brett. To me, he is like Sherlock Holmes came out of the books and was put straight to film. It’s freaking uncanny.

In any case, I had some issues with the movie. The CGI was, to me, fairly ugly and inconspicuous. It was also a bit too indulgent, which I suppose is a given with Guy Ritchie behind the wheels.

7

I watched it fairly recently too, and enjoyed the hell out of it. I’m not wholly invested in Sherlock Holmes as a character, so the lack of baggage probably helped.

What I understood about the fighting ability isn’t that Holmes is all that strong, but he knows so very much about human anatomy and can think so very quickly that he knows exactly where to put his fists and feet for maximum effect.

My favorite scene had to be the playback of the impromptu running disguise. That was bloody brilliant.

I really haven’t seen any of Guy Ritchie’s other movies, but given that Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels is on Netflix’s Instant View, I’m looking forward to giving it a go.

8

Saw it once. Won’t see it again. He’s no Basil Rathbone or even Jeremy Brett. Stick with the classics.

9

I liked it. I was never a fan of the Basil Rathbone Holmes—too staid and stuffy for me when I watched them as a kid. This version was excellent and I thought Downey and Law did a great job.

10

I expected not to enjoy it, but did; enough to buy the DVD. I agree that Downey gave a nice impression of intelligence.

One thing I didn’t like was Holmes never having met Mary Morstan before–when of course he met her during The Sign of Four, where Watson met and fell in love with her. Wasn’t consistent. And I love consistency. :wink:

11

Saw it, but it just didn’t do anything for me.

Hear, hear.

12

When you talk about the original Holmes of the stories - or the original Watson or the original Lestrade - you get into the hole that the original changed over time, and sometimes from story to story. Holmes was a cold thinking machine and a lusty creature of the streets. Holmes was a stumbling drug addict and a fanatic about self-control. Watson was an intelligent and courageous companion and a ridiculous stupid fawning foil. Lestrade did get stupider later in the stories.

This movie did pretty well in showcasing both sides, all sides, of the characters and they were much more human and interesting than the bloodless Holmeses of the past. I was baffled by the people in the earlier threads who kept insisting that none of the real Holmes was in it. There were more bones thrown to the fanatics than any Holmes movie I remember.

Once you got past Holmes into the story, the cool stuff turned into bad CGI and sloppy writing. (Although the streets of Victorian England never looked so real.)

Overall, better than I expected. But my expectations were really low.

13

I enjoyed but thought there was slightly too much action. I never pictured Zholmes running so much. And Jude Law as Watson looked too young. He’s supposed to bs slightly handicapped from his war injury.

McAdams was a disaster and completely took me out of themovie each time she appeared.

14

I thought it was almost a good film, but one great big plot hole ruined it for me.

I cannot accept anyone surviving being hanged. Hanging breaks the neck. If he had managed to avoid this, Watson would certainly have noticed it. Even if this he had somehow survived this, he would have been buried in an unmarked grave inside the prison walls. No way he could have come back from that.

I just can’t suspend disbelief that far.

15

I went into the theater with the mistaken idea that the role of Irene Adler was going to be played by Rachel Weisz, and ever time McAdams was onscreen I was thinking how much better Rachel Weisz would have been. Then I’d start thinking about what other actresses would have been better suited to the role, and had a pretty long list in my head by the time the movie was over.

16

I seem to recall a story where a big hulking man comes to threaten Holmes and Watson into not talking a case (involving his daughter?) and to intimidate them he bends a poker into a ‘U’ with no apparent sign of strain. Holmes waits until he is gone and then calmly straightens it out again with his bare hands. Watson is suitably impressed.

17

I saw the first 2/3rds before I realized that the last third was probably going to bore me just as much and bailed.

18

Downey was very good and interesting to watch, but Jeremy Brett was the incarnation of Holmes.

19

I had no interest in seeing this when it came out in the theatres. Caught in on DVD and was pleasantly surprised. Guy Richie gave it a creative touch and kept it from being generic summer fare. The music was really awesome also.

20

Saying that so-and-so is the “right” Holmes is like saying some actor is the “proper” Hamlet. There is no right or wrong way to play an archetypical role; every actor’s interpretation should be measured by its own merits, and not according to some hypothetical ideal.