Robert J. Maxwell This film has gotten some negative reviews but I'm not certain why. This is a later, Edwardian Holmes. The period detail seems precise enough. The telephone came into common use after it was installed in Buckingham Palace by Queen Victoria, which acted as a kind of placing on of hands. Men smoked cigarettes as well as pipes and cigars, although women didn't, unless they were strong-minded aristocrats or adventurous Americans. Fingerprinting was routine.Of course Rupert Everett is neither Basil Rathbone or Jeremy Brett, but at least he's tall. The character as written more or less fits Conan-Doyle's image except at the beginning, when Holmes insults Watson and tries to get rid of him. A bit too abrasive there. And Everett's default expression seems to be a sneer.Nevertheless, all the most enjoyable aspects of the Holmes tales are present in this pastiche. True, the opening scene is a little gloomy. An opium den in London. A Chinese man is seen lighting the rolls of dope in the bowl of a pipe and the camera pans slowly up to a face we must correctly assume is Holmes'. The next scene is a shot of the Mudlarks out of Dickens, sloshing around in the black mud of the Thames, clouded by industrial smoke, and finding a woman's dead body amid the muck.Thereafter the pattern becomes more familiar. Holmes shoots up once, but it's immediately after he reaches a dead end, is waiting for evidence to appear, and advises Watson that we must "possess our souls in patience." I liked it. The budget must have been sizable. The appointments are high end and the wardrobe is lavish. But the story, while simple enough in outline, involved some complicated goings on among the aristos and there were times when I couldn't attach the names to the correct figures. I had no trouble with Rachel Hurd-Wood as the thirteen-year-old kidnapee though. (Wow.) Helen McRory as the aristocrat-in-chief gives a masterful performance a s a cold, self-contained, half-mad bitch. And Michael Fassbender is outstanding as the icy footman.Yes, it's a serial killer movie but it doesn't seem like one. Conan-Doyle could have written most of this. And the detective could have been no one but Holmes -- not Philo Vance or Nero Wolfe or Charlie Chan.

johnny-08 The character of English writer Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Sherlock Holmes is probably one of the most popular invented detective. He is very calm and has very cool attitude when he's trying to solve a murder. This movie will help you to like even more this brilliant detective. It's mostly because of the actor Rupert Everett who is very good in this roll. Also I have to say something about script. It's not the best that it can be, but it's good, because you cannot understand who is the murder till' the end. This movie takes place in London, where someone is killing young ladies from rich families. This case is been given to the best detective on the world,Sherlock Holmes. He has help from his friend Dr.Watson and from Watson's fiancée Mrs.Vandeleur. This movie is good because of the actors and script. Again I have to mention Rupert Everett who proved that he is very good actor. Also Ian Hart played well as Watson. Please look this movie with patience and watch a good performance from a fine actor.

warlock Only one quick thing to point out. If holmes is believed to be born in 1854, then in 1903 he is 49, Rupert Everett was about 45 when he did the film so he was certainly in the correct age range. In fact if stories are really to be done faithfully, then from 1887 to 1893, the actor in the role should be between 33-39. In any event this is never brought up because of the belief that holmes is an elder statesman. Remember he is 60 around the time of world war one. So please give all of us a break with this age nonsense.The overall production was well mounted and since the original stories have been done so well by Jeremy Brett, a new pastiche always fun because it is new. We are sometimes married to these movies being complete retreads of the old stories. The reality is that new stories can also have value of fleshing out and perhaps exploring situations we have not seen Holmes in before.

MiCroStoogE Rupert Everett's Holmes makes me miss Jeremy Brett all the more. Everett looks much too healthy for Sherlock Holmes, particularly one who, at the opening of this version, has "retired" into a life of opium use.Well, we can't have Jeremy Brett, but is a good story too much to ask for? The entire story keys on fingerprint identification, a crime-solving technology unknown in Doyle's stories. Since Holmes' career roughly coincided with the first uses of fingerprints to solve crimes and *Scotland Yard's* establishment of the first fingerprint bureau, it seems to me the writers could have made a great Holmes story out of this "new" crime-solving technology, if they had cared. Perhaps Holmes might have reacted with suspicion to this new technique that HE did not pioneer (especially if introduced by the despised Lestrade!), convinced himself that it had merit, reacted with frustration when the fingerprints of the killer did not match the chief suspect, then (in a typical Holmesian flash of insight) realized the truth Just In Time to save the killer's intended next victim. It was a twist Doyle himself used more than once (e.g., in A Study In Scarlet and The Man With The Twisted Lip) but that could have made it seem all the more authentic.PBS showed this on Masterpiece Theatre, but it's no Masterpiece. It's watchable, certainly, but it could have been much more.