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In 2009’s Sherlock Holmes, director Guy Ritchie combined his signature gritty action with classic English literature to create a cool but ridiculously complex adventure flick. With the sequel, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, he’s ironed out a few of the flaws and added a cunning new villain to create an adventure that outperforms the original.
Robert Downey, Jr. once again gives a perfectly over-the-top performance as the erratic sleuth. As his long-time friend and partner in crime-solving, Dr. John Watson (Jude Law), prepares to get married, Holmes is caught up in a new case. A number of recent bombings have been linked to various anarchist groups, but Holmes suspects that someone cooler and more calculating is behind it all: Professor James Moriarty (Jared Harris).
At first, Watson brushes it off as another one of Holmes’s paranoid conspiracy theories. But when he and his new wife, Mary (Kelly Reilly), are attacked while on their honeymoon, Watson decides that he has no choice but to join his old friend on one last adventure.
Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows isn’t the same old brainless action movie. Sure, there are plenty of cleverly choreographed fights and massive explosions—all shot in Ritchie’s edgy signature style. And, fortunately, they look much better here than they did in the original film. But those explosive action sequences are the result of a fascinating game of cat-and-mouse, as played by Holmes and his brilliant rival, Moriarty.
The rivalry between the two men gives the story more interest—and though their scenes together aren’t particularly thrilling, it’s still fun to watch the two brilliant but entirely dissimilar minds at work. While Downey’s Holmes is wonderfully unhinged and wildly impulsive, Harris’s Moriarty is his perfect opposite: cold, calculating, and absolutely ruthless.
The other characters, too, add to the fun of this 19th-century thrill ride. Level-headed and often outraged, Law’s Watson once again makes the ideal partner for the loopy sleuth. And Stephen Fry brings a few laughs as Holmes’s amiable but competitive older brother, Mycroft.
Of course, that’s not to say that this sequel is without its share of flaws. At 129 minutes long, it does tend to ramble on through a number of unnecessary scenes—and, once again, Rachel McAdams is completely pointless as Irene Adler.
The plot, too, is still needlessly complex (though, on the bright side, it’s nowhere near as complex as the original), traveling from England to France to Switzerland on a mission that somehow involves a gypsy fortune teller (Noomi Rapace) and her missing brother. But although you might not follow every last detail of the meandering story, it doesn’t really matter. You’ll be able to enjoy the action and the scenery and the intriguing characters anyway.
It may not be a taut thriller, but Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows is nevertheless a worthwhile sequel—an action-packed adventure for literary types.
Blu-ray Review:
Often, a film’s Blu-ray release comes with a special features menu that’s filled with dry and mostly unnecessary extras—but that’s not the case here. In fact, the extras on the Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows Blu-ray release are about as entertaining as the film itself.
If you want to take your extras on the go, you can download the film’s movie app. But the main feature included on the disc is the Maximum Movie Mode, a kind of enhanced video commentary that includes all kinds of behind-the-scenes footage that plays alongside the movie. Hosted by Robert Downey, Jr., it’s an insightful and often absolutely hilarious experience.
If you don’t have the time to re-watch the entire movie with Robert Downey, Jr., though, you can check out some of the film’s focus points instead. The special features menu includes seven of them (for a grand total of more than a half-hour). Here, you’ll find plenty of behind-the-scenes footage—everything from the various locations to on-set chess games. But you’ll also get to explore the characters’ relationships in more depth. And, since the relationships give the film much of its interest, the related focus points are well worth watching.
It isn’t often that you’ll find Blu-ray extras quite this entertaining. So, by all means, if you have some extra time after watching the movie (or if you’re looking for something to do on a rainy afternoon), be sure to check them out.
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