There is Nothing So Important as Very Large Explosions

Thanks to Twitter, I've witnessed Bill Corbett and Trace Beaulieu wish each other Merry Christmas. If there can be peace between Crows, perhaps there's hope for the rest of us.

After getting up somehow at 8:30am this morning, I went with family to see the new Sherlock Holmes movie called Sherlock Holmes. It wasn't too bad. I went in expecting light weight pastiche and mainly that's what I got. Holmes predicting peoples' movements in fight scenes was neat. The actual deduction on display, rather like the Basil Rathbone movies, tended to rely on keeping large amounts of information from the audience or acting like things that were relatively obvious weren't so. A lot of random Holmes quotes were sprinkled in the dialogue, delivered well by Robert Downey Jr., who's the best thing about the movie. His Holmes is easily the most inward I've seen, often with a far away look that managed to come off as though he's mentally ten steps ahead of everyone else in every matter or simply concerned with something else entirely. I'd rather like to see him do an actual Holmes story.

Jude Law was fine as Watson, though I'm a little depressed by the usual speculation that Holmes and Watson are closeted homosexuals. It's not so much because I suspect it comes from people being unable to believe two men can have affection for each other without it being romantic or sexual is it is that suspect most people can't buy affection between two people without it being romantic or sexual. One of the things I liked about the first few seasons of the X-Files was that Scully and Mulder weren't automatically lovers even though they had a close working relationship and had affection for each other. Of course, that couldn't last. But, oh, well. If everyone wants everyone to be having sex, I won't stand in the way. But this was all covered already in The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, and the way no-one remembers that movie is probably indicative of how long this movie will stick around in the cultural consciousness.

Actually, this new Sherlock Holmes most strongly reminded me of Young Sherlock Holmes, which had a similar focus on apparently supernatural conspiracy. A significant portion of what Holmes deduced about the plot of the main villain, though, actually seemed to come from Alan Moore's From Hell.

The character most short-changed in the new film is Irene Adler. When I heard about her character being in the film, I knew she could only overshadow Holmes or he would overshadow her--neither of which would have been appropriate but, of course, it turned out to be the latter, both due to writing and Rachel McAdams' portrayal. I strongly suspect her presence was due to studio insistence--I know a hot young woman is required by law to be present in all major films, but I couldn't help finding it strange seeing someone whose doesn't seem to have much, particularly compared to Downey Jr. 's Holmes, in the way of psychological depths playing "the woman."

Again, it was a fun movie. But I'm glad for DVDs of the Jeremy Brett series.

Last night's tweets;

The blue filtered clouds criticise cities.
Cats take ribbons through Transylvania.
Science is the charge of distant kitties.
Small plastic bottles hold bacteria.