Tag Archives: Robert Downey Jnr

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows posters

Guy Ritchie’s sequel to Sherlock Holmes is due to be released this winter, and Omnimystery News have just put up some new posters:

The first of these seems to give us our first glimpse of Jared Harris as Professor Moriarty. I’m rather pleased they’ve gone for the bearded George Zucco look – if this film manages to conjure half the fun of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, they’ll be doing alright.

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Teaching Sherlock Holmes #1

As some of you may know, over the past few years I’ve been researching and writing my PhD in Film at the University of Warwick. One of the real benefits of this long and arduous process has been the opportunity to teach undergraduates, and to try to convey some of my enthusiasm for the subject.

I’m really excited about next week, when I’m assisting Michael Lightborne on his Adaptation course. He’s asked me to teach a two-week module on transmedia Sherlock Holmes. Planning this work has been very pleasant indeed: I’ve been trawling through all my DVDs, books and comics finding examples of Conan Doyle’s immense influence on culture.

Next week, I’m going to be showing my students Rathbone’s Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon alongside Brett’s The Dancing Men, two very different riffs on the same source material. We’re also going to be running a workshop which will project three different reels of Sherlockian material, allowing the students to explore the space, making their own connections between different adaptations.

Putting together these reels has been tremendous fun. We’re using clips from the Rathbone films, the Brett series, the Wilmer and Cushing BBC episodes, The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, Murder by Decree, Without a Clue and the recent Cumberbatch and Downey Jr. versions. We’ll also have a slideshow running displaying illustrations, advertising material and pages from comic books.

In the second week, I’m going to be lecturing on a more focused case study, comparing the approaches of the Cumberbatch and Downey Jr. Sherlocks, and asking what prompted their creative decisions.

I think it should be a stimulating couple of sessions and I can’t wait to see what the students make of it all! Needless to say, I shall report back on our findings here at Squeezegut Alley…

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Sherlock Holmes 2

Some set photos have been appearing for Guy Ritchie’s sequel to Sherlock Holmes, so I thought I’d post them and get your opinions.

with Noomi Rapace

I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the first film. The relationship between Downey Jnr and Law was nicely pitched and the script was very confident at translating Sherlock Holmes into an action movie franchise. Granted, there were some longeurs and, predictably, the action sequences were sometimes too enthusiastically brutish. Still, I thought it worked well as a comic spin on Conan Doyle. In many ways, it reminded me of Without a Clue.

I’m pleased to see that Holmes and Watson are getting out into the countryside this time. So far all we know is that this film introduces Stephen Fry as Mycroft and Jared Harris as Moriarty. There have also been rumours of location shoots in Austria – doubling for Reichenbach, perhaps?

Well, over to you. Are you looking forward to this next installment of the franchise, and what do you make of these photos?

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