Movie Review: 'Sherlock Holmes'

Photo: Contributed - Warner Bros.

Rating: 3 out 5 – Great action, however the convoluted story leads to confusion.

Right from the beginning of the film, Sherlock Holmes (Robert Downey Jr) is thrust into an action sequence after a bomb explodes, and he is led into an alleyway by his former love interest, Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams in a small cameo). 

During the attack, you get a pretty good sense of how the film is going play out: straight action, little story or dialogue!

Discovering that his long time nemesis Professor Moriarty (Jared Harris) is behind the bomb plots, Holmes wrangles in his partner Dr. Watson (Jude Law), who is about to be married, into helping him catch Moriarty red handed.

Moriarty however will not go quietly and instead decides to target those closest to Holmes, Adler and Dr. Watson. 

Enter a very pretty gypsy, who seems to be very skilled with a knife!  Sim (Noomi Repace) has unwillingly become part of Moriarty’s plan - to bring down Europe through an impending war – allowing him to sell high-end automatic weapons to the highest bidder.

Sim has been looking for her brother, who seems to have fallen into the clutches of Moriarty, and her first priority is to save him from whatever diabolical deed Moriarty has set up for him.

The action sequences are filmed in classic Guy Ritchie style and makes for some spectacular visual eye-candy…  the first few times!  I started noticing throughout the film though that the minute the story line started to wane, the action sequences became more frequent, making it difficult at moments to find my place in the story again. 

The banter between Holmes and Watson are always great to watch as Downey Jr and Law have great chemistry and comedic timing. The scenes between Downey Jr and Harris are even more so as they definitely make worthy opponents, both having immense respect yet great disdain for one another.  I found the chess scenes between the two some of the best, including their final showdown.

I was looking forward to delving a little bit more into the characters of the film but found the minute we the audience starting feeling something for one of the characters…  blamo!  Action sequence!  It just seemed to take away from the film, and because of it I found that Noomi Repace’s (who was brilliant in the original ‘Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’) character got lost in the shuffle.  It was nice to see her though without subtitles running underneath her dialogue, and I hope to see much, much more of her in the future.

‘Game of Shadows’ does make for some great entertainment, and if you are looking for some very stylish butt-kicking montages, this is your film!  But, if you are looking for more of a mystery driven, detective like sleuth film – or something different from director Guy Ritchie - you may find yourself a wee bit disappointed!

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.