Sherlock Holmes

PG-13	Rottentomatoes.com Rating:69%	2009
(Mild llanguage, harsh violence, a scene of sensuality)	Picky Flicks Quote: "Playing literature's greatest detective as a sort of self-loathing action hero, Downey has an absolute blast. And thanks to his performance in Sherlock Holmes, so do we." -Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic	RUNTIME: 2hrs. 8 mins.
Visit:www.screenit.com for complete details		Movie Mood: Inquisitive

If you—like me—took one look at the preview for Sherlock Holmes and shrieked, “Egads! What have they done to him?!” never fear. The full length feature is considerably less like a surreal version of something that should be entitled Fast-and-the-Furious-Meets-Horse-Drawn-Carriages than the advertising blitz would have us believe. Thank goodness.

Granted, I do not share Guy Ritchie’s (SH's director) unabated enthusiasm for slow-motion shots of one man’s bare knuckles crashing into another’s jawbone. Still. The film manages to give the art of 19th century deductive reasoning a modern (at times hyperactive) edge without completely obliterating its source material. That’s mostly thanks to Robert Downey Jr.’s performance as Holmes. Combine this role with his portrayal of playboy millionaire Tony Stark in Iron Man, and ol’ Bobby’s fast becoming the poster child for bad boy heroes with hearts of gold. Clichéd? Certainly. But he’s good enough to make you not care.

Honestly, for those familiar with Holmes, this version might not look terribly familiar. Gone is the fastidious bastion of cool, collected thought, replaced instead by a taciturn almost-drunk who wouldn’t know what a clean shirt looked like if it fell off a laundry line and onto his back. He’s obsessive (but then, so is the literary Holmes), antisocial (okay, he was that a bit too), and smart-mouthed. And though Downey Jr.’s British accent is crisp (he keeps his upper lip so stiff and his syllables so clipped that I had a hard time keeping up with his dialogue at times), there’s very little of the stereotypical English reserve in his methods.

In fact, this Holmes throws both his body and his brains (in that order, usually) at a puzzle, engaging in as many rounds of fisticuffs (a polite term for beating the snot out of somebody with your bare hands) as battles of wit. The plot of Sherlock Holmes isn’t even that important here. There’s an evil adversary who’s involved in an ancient “brotherhood” (read: cult) and who might or might not have been hanged and then risen from the dead. Holmes cares about all this about as little as we do. All he's concerned with is figuring out how his enemy is accomplishing his feats of terror and then outwitting him and beating him to the punch (oftentimes quite literally).

On hand to aid Holmes in, well, everything from getting out of the house and wearing different pants than he wore yesterday to subduing the bad guys, is Dr. Watson (a surprisingly dapper Jude Law), a true Englishman who is capable of keeping his cuffs sparkling, thanks very much. But Watson is no soft-bellied man of science. No, he’s a fit ex-military man, a brawler too when the situation calls for it as it does in one particularly amusing sequence involving a Frenchman the size of a small tank.

In fact, it is Sherlock Holmes's capacity for humor that makes it so enjoyable. It’s slick, highly edited entertainment, and it knows not to take itself too seriously. Without the solid performances from Downey Jr. and Law (Rachel McAdams as the obligatory femme fatale is good too), the short-on-substance, long-on-action storyline might have gotten tiresome some sixty minutes in. Instead, there are enough wisecracks and twists to keep things cooking for over two hours until the inevitable cliffhanger of an ending (sequel, please).

So, when all the clues are in, what do I deduce? Well, if you’re looking for a well-executed caper of a film that lets the detectives onscreen do the majority of the heavy-lifting in the mental department, Sherlock Holmes really is an elementary conclusion, my dear readers. (Sorry, couldn’t resist).

Until next Wednesday, stay picky! Your mind will thank you later.