Sherlock

I must admit to having enjoyed Young Sherlock Holmes, as unfaithful to Doyle's stories as it may have been. But there are limits.

A Case of Evil is simply dreadful. The Holmes played by James D'Arcy is a man completely ruled by his passions, the very opposite of the character portrayed by Doyle, who occasionally showed an appalling indifference to justice, enjoying the solution of a puzzle for its own sake and ignoring the suffering of innocent victims.

The movie begins with Holmes apparently killing off Moriarty, and follows with the nation celebrating him for the gallant deed. Huh? According to Doyle, practically no one but Holmes was aware of Moriarty's role as the Napoleon of Crime. Holmes bragging of murdering the man should have gotten him locked up.

The whole thing seemed to be an excuse for making Moriarty responsible for the invention of heroin. This involves Sherlock's original grudge against Moriarty to be the addiction of his brother Mycroft, portrayed as a pathetic wimp by the wasted talents of Richard Grant, who made such a grand villain in a recent version of The Hound of the Baskervilles.

I must admit that I was spellbound whenever Vincent d'Onofrio's Moriarty was chewing up the scenery. Quite a contrast from his portrayal of Conan creator Robert E. Howard as deluded hick in The Whole Wide World.

I liked the movie. I thought all the main characters did a really good job.

But I also have a very bad taste in movies. I think the Richard Grant thing was a bit unnecessary. The idea of bringing a past into it was interesting, but not really developed as much as it could have been. I never fully understood why they brought him in to the story and to be honest, even as a Richard Grant fan, I didn't care much about the character. He could have been brought a bit more into the story. But D'arcy was great. So was the guy who played Watson. Still, the way they left it off, there is room for sequels. So unless they bring Grant back into the story later, I don't know. I think the scene and he story were well done, but just not as necessary as everything else.

This movie is not faithful to Conan-Doyle's characters. Mycroft is a disabled recluse instead of a strong-willed, mover-and-shaker in the government. Dr. Watson is a mortician instead of a physician. Sherlock is a drunken womanizer (I suspect that if a person were to really drink all that he did in one evening, that person would end up in the hospital ... or the morgue). Vincent D'Nofrio's performance of Dr. Moriarty comes across as stilted and silly, not at all the brilliant and witty character we are used to seeing; although, I suspect that may be due more to the script than to the acting.

That said, I tried to view the movie on its own merits rather than comparing it to the original stories and other depictions of Sherlock, and this movie still has value as entertainment. The canes doubling as swords and one-shot guns was clever. The sword fights were interesting. Dr. Moriarty as the inventor of a new drug was ingenious.

It wasn't what I'd hoped for, but I'm still glad that I watched it.

After reading comments on IMDB for some some years now I'm beginning to think that there are an awful lot of self-styled film critics on the board that believe they'll be taken more seriously if they sneeringly disparage everything they see. True, it's easier to carve up a film than really critique it, but that ill serves the other board visitors who are mostly trying to get an impression of a movie to see if it's worth seeing.

This is far exaggerated with any Sherlock Holmes film, since they (including me) can be pretty picky and very purist in outlook. I don't mind straying a bit from The Canon, or even taking a severe liberty or two if the end product is enjoyable. I was perfectly prepared, of course, to dislike this made-for-TV movie and went in expecting very little. I was pleasantly surprised.I enjoyed it.

It took many liberties with The Canon, to be sure, but I enjoyed the several departures from established plotlines and character. It's hard to take new approaches to this genre, and I think this one worked well in the end.

I'd give it a good honest seven, or thereabouts, which is more than I'd give most of the critics on this Board. If you're a Holmes fan, watch this one. It's miles better than some of the sappy efforts we're used to.

I saw this movie recently with the very greatest of hopes.

I have been a Sherlock Holmes fan for as long as I can remember, so when I saw the box for this film on the shelves at my local video store, I yanked it up without even looking at the synopsis on the back. After watching the movie, I might have enjoyed the synopsis more...a LOT more.

The characters were two-dimensional and under-developed at very best: no depth at all was brought to any one of them, but for the struggling Rebecca Doyle, portrayed by Gabrielle Anwar...and in this setting, finding anything to like about her was a struggle. James D'Arcy never even saw the mark in attempting to bring humanity to the legendary Holmes; he just came off weak and vacillating in D'Arcy's hands. Vincent D'Onofrio - of whom I am an incredible fan normally, and who is notoriously known as "the Human Chameleon" for his most uncanny ability to lose himself in a role - just phoned this performance in, when I'd have loved to have seen a far more layered interpretation of this legendary bad guy. Roger Morlidge does a serviceable job of Dr. Watson, but it's just not enough.

The plot was presumptuous of far too much detail relevant to the Holmes legend to introduce such intricacies as the reasoning behind the heroin addiction suffered by he and his brother, without providing much substantive sub-plot to make it plausible...or even make us care.

The fencing battles between Holmes and Moriarty are well-executed, but only consume a cumulative twenty minutes of the film at the very most.

Writer Piers Ashworth didn't think outside the box in his creation of this "new perspective", he just created a new box and hopped right in. Director Graham Theakston didn't seem to even attempt to transcend the poor scripting with crafty, smart, or inspiring visuals.

I just didn't get it.