Detective Sherlock Holmes has been popular for years. If you do a search for the character on IMDB you’ll see that since 1911 there have been 120 movies and shows about the character. The best known ones are of course the movie with Robert Downey Jr. and the BBC series starring Benedict Cumberbatch. You might wonder, because already so much content is available about him, whether it is still possible to make something about Sherlock Holmes which feels fresh. But that’s exactly what Mr. Holmes tries to do.
This is done by not focussing on the period in which he worked on cases together with Watson. In this version Sherlock Holmes (Ian McKellen) is a 93-year-old man who lives far from London, doesn’t have any contact with his former associate and doesn’t take new cases anymore. It is a life he has left behind. The only people he still talks to are his housekeeper Mrs. Munro (Laura Linney) and her son Roger (Milo Parker).
Sherlock has lost his sharpness and start to show serious signs of dementia. Still the last case he ever did keeps him occupied. Because Roger is also very interested in it he tries to remember and write down its details in the hope of finally finding peace.
If you are expecting the same action filled moments which are present in the Guy Ritchie movies than Mr. Holmes is not the movie you should be watching. It is one which slowly builds and takes its time for everything, without ever becoming boring. You witness how an old man deals with his inner demons and what his connection is with the people around him. Besides that various flashbacks show his last case, which works quite well too.
This is mainly thanks to the amazing acting by Ian McKellen. He injects so much personality into the character that you can’t help but to care for him. Just like Roger you want to find out how his last case turned out. This isn’t a Sherlock Holmes movie like the ones that came before it, but shows what the character could turn into as an elderly man. With that it has succeeded to make another Sherlock Holmes movie feel fresh.
This film has totally passed me by but sounds fascinating, particularly as I’m a big fan of the Sherlcok Holmes stories, the BBC series and of Ian McKellen and Laura Linney.
Dan, than you really should try to check it out.