First off, this is a little late, but I didn’t see the movie until Monday. I meant to see it as well as several other movies lately, but time and finances have prevented it, which sucks. None the less, if you haven’t seen it and want my input (or if you have and want it anyway), then here you are.
Secondly, this movie has been getting a lot of crap from reviewers. I have a beef with internet reviewers about 50% of the time. It’s either I agree with them 100% or not at all lately. This is one of the instances I disagree with most of the ones I’ve read (I’m looking at you Mania.com).
The plot starts off a bit of time after the first movie. Rachel McAdam’s character (Irene Adler) makes a return in the beginning only to seemingly being followed by some shady individuals. In the last movie she had been revealed to be under the influence of Professor Moriarty (Who wasn’t shown in the first movie, but is played by Jared Harris in this film). Well iRobert Downey Jr.’s Sherlock shows up and gets in an awesome fight using his deduction skills from the first movie, but in a total visual manner in this case, and averts a crime with massive casualties.
In the background France and Germany are at each other’s neck readying for war, and Moriarty is behind all of it. Holmes is trying to figure out why and I’m going to stop there with the plot synopsis, because I’m going to start ruining things (also Watson is getting married, a plot point carried over from the first movie).
The main thing I saw criticized in a lot of the reviews were the recycling of the deduction based fighting Sherlock does. I found this to be one of the best things about the first film. I think this is tantamount to saying, well Superman flew in all of those other movies, it’s just the same thing again. In a couple of instances, instead of vocally explaining the scenario, Director Guy Ritchie uses visual cues to emphasize what Holmes is seeing and predicting. There are two instances of a fight being analyzed like the boxing match in the first movie (with a bit of narration), one starts out like said boxing match, but then goes to hell, which is an awesome spin. The other is near the end and is so cool in it’s application, I can’t bring myself to specifically reference it, but you’ll know it when you see it.
The other critique is that the mystery isn’t as grand, and I’ll leave the specifics alone on this one, but I just don’t agree with that. There are a bunch of layers to the mystery and the metaphorical (and literal) chess game Holmes and Moriarty are playing. There is a dimension of non-interaction with the climax on Holmes’ and Moriarty’s part, but that leads to the practicality of Moriarty’s role in the scheme as well as the suspense of the overall situation.
Watson and Holmes’ relationship is continued and expanded upon. They become, maybe better friends in the process. Holmes’ trust in his partner is taken to new heights in the climax and the way Law and Downey play off of each other is as great as ever.
In the end Game of Shadows is at least as good as the first outing with the 21st century’s Sherlock Holmes’ series, maybe better due to the rivalry between Moriarty and Holmes. Stylistically not as original as the first movie, well duh, it’s a sequel, people aren’t seeing it for a completely different type of movie. See it and you won’t be disappointed.
4.5 out of 5 … magnifying glasses or detective hats, neither of those are in this movie… whatever.
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