And that’s your problem. Nobody, and I’m not using the word to be mean but to indicate an objective truth, nobody involved in this film cares what you think. At all.
I’m down with it. Ultimate Holmes. What’s not to like?
It’s not like they got Millar to write it or something.
I don’t think the skepticism some as myself have with this movie boils down so easily to explicit faithfulness to the source material, as much as the feeling that the overall action(!) tone seems contradictory to the spirit of the character. Or at least not complementary.
This might just be a failing of the trailers so far, as Whitta has suggested, but they’ve given the impression of jokes we generally make about Hollywood taking classic characters and THIS AIN’T YOUR GRANDMA’S MOBY DICKizing them. (American McGee says wut up, bitches!)
Whether or not it actually makes a good movie, I’m going to see for myself, certainly. I expect it will be entertaining in the least given the talents involved … but as far as the trailers I’ve been getting a real Poochy vibe.
Ah, Universe; you so do enjoy making fools of us all.
This is true. He’s like the Daniel Day-Lewis of people not named Daniel Day-Lewis.
One of the best books I read last year was a collection of short stories placing Holmes and Watson in the Cthulhy mythos, so I am not exactly a purist. There’s a ton about this movie that appeals to me.
Oh shit, BEST IDEA EVER.
Jason Statham as Holmes, Amy Smart as Watson.
And Breckin Meyer as Edgar Allan Poe.
And Adam Scott as Young Lincoln?
Natalie Portman will be great as the love interest.
YES PLEASE
I’m a Sherlock Holmes fan - I’ve read most, if not all, of the Doyle books and stories. It’s been a while though, so I’m not fully confident on the specifics.
Anyways, the Holmes I remember was a cerebral sort - who solved mysteries via deduction, not via violence. Yes, I remember some hinting that Holmes was a physically capable guy, and there were a few instances in the stories/books where physicality came into play. But that was NOT a feature of the story.
Assuming Holmes is now a copyright expired/public domain character (as I think he is), then the moviemakers can take him pretty much any direction they want. They can make him a magician, an alien, or a cowboy. Of course, those directions would be huge departures from the canonical Holmes. If, in this movie, Holmes is a 19th century action hero, then while that’s a lesser departure than making Holmes a cowboy, I think some fans can still be a bit disappointed in the turn.
That said, I haven’t seen too much of Holmes on the screen, in the various incarnations over the years. At best, I’ll probably see this version on DVD or TV sometime down the line.
It’s interesting to see people defending changes in the story for this movie, updating it for modern audiences or picking out small bits of the character and making them more prominent, but when it’s a comic book or fantasy book or sci-fi book adaptation… the text is sacrosanct! Never diverge from the source! If you wanted to make that, why’d you license it! Blah blah blah.
So RDJ will be playing himself.
I am no Holmes geek, but I agree that the script is top-notch. One of my favorite reads of the past year.
I think it’s one of those things that people have this image of Holmes built up in their head of him being a certain way from “classic depictions”, even if they weren’t wholly accurate from the original books. Think 1939 Wizard of Oz – not very much like the book, but when everyone thinks of Dorothy, they think of the version from that movie.
Yeah. I mean does anybody even read anymore?
Who cares about the original source material? What matters is how was he depicted ON TV!
This is the big question mark for me. Will we be getting the Guy Ritchie of Two Smoking Barrels, Snatch, and RocknRolla; or the Guy Ritchie of Swept Away and Revolver?
Depends on where you are. IIUC, in the UK & EU, copyrights are “life + 70 years” - i.e., they last for 70 years after the author’s death. Doyle died in 1930, so all of his works (inc. Holmes) became public domain in 2000 over there. [Actually the UK used to be “life + 50 years” but that got extended to 70 when they joined the EU; so Doyle’s work became public domain in the UK in 1980, but then retroactively became copyrighted again when they joined the EU before expiring again in 2000. Laws are funny sometimes.]
U.S. copyright law is bit weirder. IIUC, works published before 1923 are all in the public domain. For works published between 1923 and 1978, copyright is based on the date of publication - a maximum of 95 years. Which means most of the original Holmes stories are now public domain in the U.S., but about 10 of them were published after 1923. I’m not sure if this means the characters themselves are public domain, though.
Well, there is the accent.