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Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011)

Director: Guy Ritchie

Time Out rating

Average user rating

34 reviews

Movie review

From Time Out London

When Guy Ritchie’s witty, enjoyable reboot of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s iconic detective stories busted blocks back in 2009, a follow-up was unavoidable. Cynics would argue that a visit from that scourge of movie sequels, the law of diminishing returns, was equally inevitable – but that doesn’t stop this overlong romp from being a disappointment.

We find Holmes (Robert Downey Jr) already hot on the trail of his latest nemesis, ‘Napoleon of crime’, James Moriarty (Jared Harris). When the mad professor schemes to have Holmes’s on-off squeeze murdered, our hero spirals into depression – until the return of his trusty sidekick Watson (Jude Law) shakes him out of his torpor and sets him back on the warpath, following a trail of destruction that will lead to Paris, Germany and – inevitably – Switzerland’s Reichenbach Falls.

The best comparison to draw here is with the ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ sequels: the cast and crew remain unchanged, but a key ingredient is lacking. Perhaps it’s a sense of spontaneity: where the first film seemed genuinely sprightly and off-the-cuff, the outcome of every thunderous, whizz-bang, CG-fuelled action scene in the sequel feels – that word again – inevitable. Downey Jr even seems to be attempting a kind of knock-off Jack Sparrow, slapping on the eyeliner and chucking in a few inappropriate nod-wink asides.

Salvation arrives in the form of Stephen Fry as Holmes’s brother, Mycroft, and while the role of an upper-crust homosexual with a schoolmasterly demeanour and encyclopaedic intellect isn’t exactly a stretch for the nation’s favourite quizmaster, it’s a welcome distraction from the increasingly stale banter of the two leads. The result is a fitfully amusing but largely unsurprising and uninvolving action-movie-by-numbers: elementary, and not in a good way.

Author: Tom Huddleston

Time Out London Issue 2156: 15 – 21 December, 2011

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User reviews of this film

Gee said...

Posted on Jan 29 2012 13:59 Totally disagree with timeout rating this was a clever, well-executed film with excellent comic timing and a storyline. The Downey Junior and Law coupling is charming and perfect. At least as good as the first which was excellent

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AshleighKathryn said...

Posted on Jan 27 2012 12:02 i cant believe this got such a low rating! i went and saw it trwice. I thought the chemistry between holmes and watson was totally upped from the first and as always love robert and judes versions of the characters. To compare it to bbcs sherlock i find really long leap though, to me they are completely different and both amazingly addictive in their own rights. so basically go see it on the big screen while you still can! 10/10

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Cappybear said...

Posted on Jan 25 2012 19:57 I enjoyed the first Sherlock Holmes movie but found the sequel to be charmless, long-winded and boring. Noomi Rapace wandered around like she was on the wrong set. On the other hand, my wife enjoyed the film, though she too thought it way too long.

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Sophie said...

Posted on Jan 08 2012 02:23 I found myself resting my eyes during many of the action scenes which says a lot, because it usually takes quite a bit for me to close my eyes when Jude is on the screen, but there were simply far too many and most of them seemed unneccessary. Noomi Rapace's character is really one-dimensional and boring and doesn't add anything to the story. Stephen Fry is great though. Love the dialogue and the originality of the two main characters which sadly took second place to the action in this sequel, but on the good side the plot was slightly less silly than in the first one.

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Essie Vessey said...

Posted on Jan 07 2012 23:07 Totally disagree with your film critic. This was a brilliant film even better than the first. As usual if an official film critic says the film is rubbish then I know it's going to be great cos they don't have a clue!

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chris said...

Posted on Jan 05 2012 20:46 Feel-good, cinematic fun - if you were expecting the BBC series, then one can see why you might be disappointed (or perhaps delusioned?); yet, Ritchie's film is fun banter with great shots. I'm a massive fan of the BBC1 series too, but am glad to see the film interpretation's lighter. action-packed, approach.

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Polly said...

Posted on Jan 05 2012 19:35 About three moments I thought were good , including "The End" ? The rest was gratuitously violent, not brilliantly acted, a bit of a boring story, loads of sexism and didnt have any of the cleverness of "real " Sherlock Holmes. If I were a cynic I could say they use the names to increase takings but it has nothing to do with the original.

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GS said...

Posted on Jan 05 2012 10:41 It's all a bit of a bish bosh mish mash kind of film. Amusing here and there but not a very good movie.
I

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Bakerstreet said...

Posted on Jan 05 2012 09:51 I totally disagree with this sniffy TO review - if you're looking for a hugely entertaining movie to cure the January blues, one which will thrill, amuse and make you laugh, then go and see this. Yes it's not going to triumph at Cannes, but it's acted with great gusto and commitment, technically superb, excitingly directed and for all the criticism of the plot, the globetrotting adventure story is engaging and works. The CGI and the detailed evocation of late Victorian London and Europe is extremely impressive and completely immerses you in another world - a feat which the TO review ignores - and the gentlemen face-offs between Holmes and Moriarty (an intriguing, well-cast baddie) are compelling. The bromance between Holmes and Watson is camped up and good fun and it's the friendship between the two which gives the film its heart. I enjoyed the first SH reboot, but this sequel is more ambitious and in many ways the better for it.

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stevhors said...

Posted on Jan 03 2012 23:40 Like a victorian James Bond with superb action sequences this film entertains for the full 2 hours. Don't go if you want to see anything like Conan Doyle's stories, and don't expect anything very sophisticated, but fine for an enjoyable and engaging cinema visit.

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gb said...

Posted on Jan 02 2012 20:58 Cracking action film, loved every minute, cant wait for SH-3.

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tez said...

Posted on Jan 02 2012 09:54 Brilliant bettet than the first.

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Paul said...

Posted on Jan 01 2012 19:13 A ripping yarn if a little light on clues and their detection, I went with a teenager and we both enjoyed the non-stop action. Good to see Rapace on the screen again and an evil Prof Moriarty

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FilmFan said...

Posted on Jan 01 2012 08:19 Much better than the first film in every aspect and a good way to spend about 2 1/2 hours during this Christmas holidays. I am actually already quite looking foward to the possibly inevitable third Sherlock Holmes (Christmas) film in probably three or four years time!

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john and chris said...

Posted on Dec 31 2011 16:27 Just been to see this action packed film and loved it the attention to detail was excellent and the music was great. What do people want from a film. It was pure entertainment.

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