Sherlock: Case of Evil (2002)

Just about everything about this film is awful. They've hashed up the plot and characters so badly that it almost unrecognisable as holmes, lacking all the brilliance that made the doyle stories.the casting of holmes played by some actor that looks about 19 years old with wooden acting to match and non-of the attributes that make holmes holmes, makes the entire film completely unconvincing throughout.other negative reviews are spot on, there are so many flaws its just embarrassing, .....an 18th century police swat team, impulsive sex scenes!!.Watch the jeremy brett as holmes for a more accurate portrayal in the TV series.there a reason why this film is on at 2am on a tuesday morning on itv3, its utter rubbish.

Why is everyone harping on this movie? The filming is very good for a made-for-TV movie and the story is not unrealistic or absurd. Yes, it does break away from the traditional Sherlock Holmes character, but it is supposed to be like an intro story: it sets up how/why he became the man he is in the stories. All young men are emotion driven and stupid ... even 'great' persons such as Sherlock Holmes: he was not born an emotionless deducer of science. This movie just portrays the incidents which turn him into the man of the stories. I honestly wish sequels had been made. I would love to watch this Sherlock mature and grow into the fictional hero we all know and love.

Many reviewers have pointed out just how terrible the film is and, in particular, that this "Holmes" is nothing like the real one.It's also full of terrible gaffes. "Serial killer"?! This expression dates from the 1970s, apparently coined by the FBI. The scriptwriter failed in many other ways to hit the Victorian modes of speech essential to any film set in the period.What really got me, however, was the phony newspapers. These were nothing like real Victorian ones. They had laughable banner headlines of the type otherwise seen only in Superman or Batman films. Some of them were printed on little sheets of paper, very far from the broadsheets of the time.Watch this only if you really have too much time on your hands.

Or, the summary should perhaps more accurately read, "A richness of embarrassments." The script is embarrassing. The storyline is embarrassing. The plot is embarrassing. The direction is embarrassing. The characterizations of Holmes & Watson are embarrassing, although not totally the actors' faults. James D'Arcy's Holmes is duly intense and focused, and might have shone if given a script less stupid; as it is, he's just embarrassing. Vincent Donofrio's fake accent and surprisingly crappy acting are both embarrassing. Gabrielle Anwar's character's name (Rebecca Doyle) is embarrassing. The reporter's hair is embarrassing. Inspector Lestrade is embarrassing (but then, he pretty much always is). The heavily armed London Bobby SWAT team is embarrassing. The gratuitous sex scene is embarrassing. Holmes as a leering lecher is embarrassing. The hackneyed Victorian London drug scene scenes are embarrassing. The climax is embarrassing. The closing scene is more embarrassing than the opening was. In fact, about an hour & a quarter in Inspector Lestrade himself gives this film its best one-line review: "This is a complete waste of time and resources." Everyone involved in this production who retains any self-respect whatsoever should be thoroughly embarrassed. The violence done the Canon here, the complete disregard for fidelity to the original material, is more than embarrassing, it is a crime worthy of Moriarity himself. I could go on, but now I'm too embarrassed to have been caught watching it . . .