Movie Review — Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes was better than I expected it to be.  And I suspect that is at the heart of most of the reasonably positive reviews the movies has received.  Because frankly (at least until the reviews started breaking), I was expecting something along the lines of Van Helsing — vaguely period trappings, but reeking of anachronism, and filled with quick cut editing, too clean sets, and perverted steampunk gadgets.

This one… well…

• It did feel a little anchronisticly self-aware, but not so much that loads of modern quips fell from the characters’ lips.  (And thankfully, neither did much in the way of “Bloody fair cop, guv’nor, wot?”, that shite that brands something as trying too hard to show it is Victorian low-class London, like Eliza Doolittle on a bad day.)
• The quick cut editing that I so expected was refreshingly suppressed.  Oh, it was there, but there was also obvious real fight choreography, where the action lasts more than 1/2 second per shot.  And probably the previsioning of fights that Holmes did in a couple places helped to make the quick cut editing attached to those bits more acceptable, more able to be followed.
• The CGI setpieces used in distance shots were too clean for my tastes — London didn’t feel dirty enough — but the real or closer sets felt much better.
• The steampunk gadgetry was kept to both a minimum and had a level of realism.  When I want unreal steampunk (and I do!), I read Girl Genius.

A couple other thoughts:

• I was moderately surprised that, in the midst of the threat against Parliament, there was no threat against Queen Victoria.  How restrained!
• Also restrained: nary a mention of Leather Apron.  (Unless that was behind the comment about other women having also been killed by Lord Blackwood.  And in fact, Blackwood’s victims number does match that of the “canonical five”.)
• Curious that they didn’t try to blow up Parliament.  Oh, wait, that was Guy Fawkes, not Guy Ritchie!  Wrong movie.
• I forgot about the comment that Holmes and Watson had been partners only 7 months, so I didn’t expect that the hidden villain reveal would be who it was.
• Of course, having read way too much Alan Moore reimagining of turn-of-the-century Britain fictionality, I had the fact that the villain was so totally hidden that all we ever saw were his gloves (not even his hands) pegged as being Hawley Griffin.  And thus that Griffin, derobed, was behind the final defeat of Blackwood.  (Of course, that’s still a possibility, no?)

I am definitely looking forward to Iron Man 2, though, so we can see Robert Downey Jr. continue playing this same character into another film.