Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows; let me tell you about it
If this movie had been nothing but Robert Downey Junior, Jude Law, Steven Fry, and Noomi Rapace sitting around reading various sections of the phone book aloud, I still would have enjoyed it. There was nothing that could have prevented me from enjoying this movie. And in many ways, it delivers. There's atmosphere, cool locations, big explosions, and lots and lots of homoerotic subtext.
However, and it pains me to say this...
This was not a good movie.
They just tried to do too much. They were so busy getting us from one country/fight scene to another that there was never time for the audience to get a sense of what they were trying to accomplish or what was at stake. Instead, we were just along for the ride, being carted from one action sequence to the next until the whole movie started to feel like, "And then they went to another place, and some stuff happened. Repeat ad nauseum."
Okay, this is where the spoilers start.
Do you want to leave?
No?
Okay.
The two best sequences were at the German arms factory and the Swiss peace summit, because those were the only times when we had clear goals and clear consequences for failing them. In the arms factory, Watson had to rescue Holmes or he would die. At the peace summit, they had to find and stop the assassin or war would break out. Mystery and ambiguity are all well and good, but an action movie like this works best when the audience knows exactly what the heroes are trying to accomplish. It allows us to participate in the action by getting invested in each step our heroes are taking toward or away from their goal.
The sequence in the train did not work in that way because we were never in on the plan. We were like Watson - being helplessly dragged along for the ride. Don't get me wrong; the part where Holmes flashbacks to his meticulous preparations just in time for us to snap forward and see their glorious results (BOOM) was very cool. But for the most part, it felt like, "Oh, we're pushing Mary out of the train now? And we're not following her because... Okay, now we're scooting along the outside of the train. Why? Because Holmes said so. And now we've been saved by an explosion that no one could have planned for. Fine. What were we trying to accomplish here?"
And clearly, what we (or the filmmakers) were trying to accomplish was fanservice. That's why there were so many superfluous action sequences. Not that they weren't cool, but think about it: what did Holmes's fight with the assassin at Watson's bachelor party, or the chase scene through the woods, actually add to the story? Nothing. The assassin could have been killed by Simza's thrown knife, and our heroes could have run straight through the hole in the arms factory wall and onto the train, and literally nothing would have changed. It was needless padding, because Hollywood thinks we are more interested in explosions and fight choreography than in story-building and character interaction.
Then there's fanservice of another kind. My complaints about the Ho Yay are a little harder to defend. After all, as a mad slash fan, who am I to complain that the movie was too gay? But while I appreciated the effort that the writers took to accommodate us (RDJ in drag, Steven Fry wandering around his house naked), it often felt forced. Like they were pandering to us. I honestly wonder if the entire fight sequence on the train were engineered just to get Watson on top of Holmes and between his legs, ripping Holmes's clothes apart, while Holmes is in drag. I could almost hear the writers yelling from the screen, "IS THIS GAY ENOUGH FOR YOU?" Of course it was funny. But a genuine moment between the characters is much more satisfying. I'll take Watson holding Holmes's hand and giving him a grateful glance after pulling him from the rubble of the fallen watchtower over blatant condescension any day.
I'll spare you my rabid feminist rantings, but suffice to say that they stuffed Irene Adler right in the fridge, and Noomi Rapace was completely underused.
And now, let me talk for a moment about the final battle over Reichenbach Falls. That entire scene was very well done. I would have only changed one thing (and this might be insane nitpicking, but it's my journal and I'll pick nits if I want to). In the original story, Watson didn't witness the final confrontation. He found the site of the struggle after the fact, and deduced that someone or two someones had gone over the falls. When Holmes failed to reappear, he was forced to conclude that his friend was dead. This allowed Doyle to bring Holmes back with fairly little trouble, because he wasn't forced to explain how Holmes survived a deadly drop down a waterfall. The movie, on the other hand, showed Holmes going over the edge in loving slo-mo, making his return at the end of the movie more than a little weird. Willing suspension of disbelief only goes so far. Now, here's what they should have done: Holmes and Moriarty play out the fight in their heads and they look at each other knowingly. Cut to Watson, who comes out onto the balcony to find the snow swept off the ledge as if something large has fallen over it. He looks down the falls, a look of trepidation on his face. Cut back to England, where Watson's narration tells us that neither Holmes nor Moriarty has been heard from since. Sure, in my scenario it would have been painfully obvious to the viewer that Holmes wasn't dead, but so what? They brought him back within five minutes anyway! And even if they hadn't, it's not as if we really believed that they were going to kill him off.
Final estimation: bad movie, but worth watching. It's still fun. It's still cool. It still has tons of Holmes/Watson subtext. It still has Steven Fry as Mycroft (who I always thought would be ideal casting, and I was right).
It just isn't quite what I hoped for.
OMG sorry for the tl;dr.
However, and it pains me to say this...
This was not a good movie.
They just tried to do too much. They were so busy getting us from one country/fight scene to another that there was never time for the audience to get a sense of what they were trying to accomplish or what was at stake. Instead, we were just along for the ride, being carted from one action sequence to the next until the whole movie started to feel like, "And then they went to another place, and some stuff happened. Repeat ad nauseum."
Okay, this is where the spoilers start.
Do you want to leave?
No?
Okay.
The two best sequences were at the German arms factory and the Swiss peace summit, because those were the only times when we had clear goals and clear consequences for failing them. In the arms factory, Watson had to rescue Holmes or he would die. At the peace summit, they had to find and stop the assassin or war would break out. Mystery and ambiguity are all well and good, but an action movie like this works best when the audience knows exactly what the heroes are trying to accomplish. It allows us to participate in the action by getting invested in each step our heroes are taking toward or away from their goal.
The sequence in the train did not work in that way because we were never in on the plan. We were like Watson - being helplessly dragged along for the ride. Don't get me wrong; the part where Holmes flashbacks to his meticulous preparations just in time for us to snap forward and see their glorious results (BOOM) was very cool. But for the most part, it felt like, "Oh, we're pushing Mary out of the train now? And we're not following her because... Okay, now we're scooting along the outside of the train. Why? Because Holmes said so. And now we've been saved by an explosion that no one could have planned for. Fine. What were we trying to accomplish here?"
And clearly, what we (or the filmmakers) were trying to accomplish was fanservice. That's why there were so many superfluous action sequences. Not that they weren't cool, but think about it: what did Holmes's fight with the assassin at Watson's bachelor party, or the chase scene through the woods, actually add to the story? Nothing. The assassin could have been killed by Simza's thrown knife, and our heroes could have run straight through the hole in the arms factory wall and onto the train, and literally nothing would have changed. It was needless padding, because Hollywood thinks we are more interested in explosions and fight choreography than in story-building and character interaction.
Then there's fanservice of another kind. My complaints about the Ho Yay are a little harder to defend. After all, as a mad slash fan, who am I to complain that the movie was too gay? But while I appreciated the effort that the writers took to accommodate us (RDJ in drag, Steven Fry wandering around his house naked), it often felt forced. Like they were pandering to us. I honestly wonder if the entire fight sequence on the train were engineered just to get Watson on top of Holmes and between his legs, ripping Holmes's clothes apart, while Holmes is in drag. I could almost hear the writers yelling from the screen, "IS THIS GAY ENOUGH FOR YOU?" Of course it was funny. But a genuine moment between the characters is much more satisfying. I'll take Watson holding Holmes's hand and giving him a grateful glance after pulling him from the rubble of the fallen watchtower over blatant condescension any day.
I'll spare you my rabid feminist rantings, but suffice to say that they stuffed Irene Adler right in the fridge, and Noomi Rapace was completely underused.
And now, let me talk for a moment about the final battle over Reichenbach Falls. That entire scene was very well done. I would have only changed one thing (and this might be insane nitpicking, but it's my journal and I'll pick nits if I want to). In the original story, Watson didn't witness the final confrontation. He found the site of the struggle after the fact, and deduced that someone or two someones had gone over the falls. When Holmes failed to reappear, he was forced to conclude that his friend was dead. This allowed Doyle to bring Holmes back with fairly little trouble, because he wasn't forced to explain how Holmes survived a deadly drop down a waterfall. The movie, on the other hand, showed Holmes going over the edge in loving slo-mo, making his return at the end of the movie more than a little weird. Willing suspension of disbelief only goes so far. Now, here's what they should have done: Holmes and Moriarty play out the fight in their heads and they look at each other knowingly. Cut to Watson, who comes out onto the balcony to find the snow swept off the ledge as if something large has fallen over it. He looks down the falls, a look of trepidation on his face. Cut back to England, where Watson's narration tells us that neither Holmes nor Moriarty has been heard from since. Sure, in my scenario it would have been painfully obvious to the viewer that Holmes wasn't dead, but so what? They brought him back within five minutes anyway! And even if they hadn't, it's not as if we really believed that they were going to kill him off.
Final estimation: bad movie, but worth watching. It's still fun. It's still cool. It still has tons of Holmes/Watson subtext. It still has Steven Fry as Mycroft (who I always thought would be ideal casting, and I was right).
It just isn't quite what I hoped for.
OMG sorry for the tl;dr.