"To be a Holmes, you must find your own path."
Hello everyone!
Kind of like jumping off a train!
Here's the thing.
I forgot Netflix was premiering their new movie about Sherlock Holmes' younger sister last week.
I
know, I know, I should have ACTUALLY been paying attention, but sadly
my mind's been all over the place, so while I clocked into the trailer
and the date, I didn't realize the date was REALLY just around the
corner!
And there you have it. Paying attention is everything, kids.
Which
means that the Mulan cartoon is unfortunately getting bumped right
along. Because without further ado, allow me to introduce yet another
member of the prodigiously talented Holmes family: Enola Holmes.
Links
to some of my previous works revolving around the brilliant detective
can be found at the bottom of the page, because I shall admit it loud
and clear: I'm definitely a Sherlock Holmes fan. I can remember reading
his books way back when, when I was still very little and they were the
abridged versions in the kiddie section of the library. 
So yeah, you could say that once I really got on board this express, I started getting excited about the movie.
Now
I WILL point out that I went into it without any expectation
whatsoever. I had seen interviews with the three main cast members -
Millie Bobby Brown, Henry Cavill and Sam Claflin - and they all seemed
super excited about the finished product, so I was getting excited, too.
In the end, I pushed aside my love for the OG Sherlock, and just
enjoyed the two hours of mayhem created by his fictional sister.
Our
story begins with Enola's voice-over explaining a little bit about her
background and the background of the entire Holmes family, which shows
us one thing right off the bat: after the death of the patriarch, things
sort of fall apart, because the two brothers go off to school and then
settle in London while the mother and Enola remain at the family home,
and as we learn later Eudoria (Helena Bonham-Carter) actually lies to
Mycroft about what she's using his money for.
As
oldest of the males in the family, Mycroft is the one to whom all the
estate has reverted and he's financially responsible for the ladies,
natch. Sherlock can basically do his own thing.
Meanwhile,
Enola is given an education in all the subjects taught to boys at the
time, until her sixteenth birthday when her mother disappears, and Enola sends for her two
brothers (okay this is slightly ambiguous as it's never said she
ACTUALLY sends for them, but I'm making an educated guess).
She
goes to pick them up, and right off the bat as she's explaining this
(breaking the fourth wall is a thing in this movie) I'm thinking to
myself: Enola, how on Earth are you going to pick them up with your
bicycle?
Mycroft's
horrified reaction first to seeing her, and second to said bicycle, are
everything, and Claflin really delivers that annoying, exacting part of
the older brother's personality (wall-breaking mustache included).
And
on the other hand, I'm wondering how much the costume designer for this
movie started crying when Cavill's casting was announced, because MAN
does he not fit the body type of the Victorian era gentleman! If you
watch the movie closely, you'll see he doesn't actually move all
that much when he's buttoned up into the topcoat - my guess is the thing
was too tight so he couldn't ... or he was told not to so the seams
wouldn't rip.
Anyway,
the brothers learn of their mother's disappearance and explain that,
one, she always has a plan, and two, she's kind of dangerous. But now it's time to do something about Enola, and as she's
Mycroft's ward, he's about to send her to Aunt PetuniaMiss Harrison's finishing
school for young girls despite her objections, which causes her to run
away, have a run-in with an absconding Marquis, and execute a jump off a
moving train.
Together,
the two youths then make it to London where they part ways, Enola
dresses as a more-or-less respectable lady, and finds some questionable
lodgings which she's told is perfectly acceptable, but the girl really
knows nothing of the outside world, as the family housekeeper (and later jujitsu teacher at the end of a threatening teapot) tells
Sherlock, pointing out he abandoned his sister once, and that she needs
him.
So
while the two brothers are discussing progress (Mycroft has a thing
against progress, you see, and the movie takes place during the 1840s bill to reform voting rights) and how to find their little runaway(s)
(and Sherlock should have deduced things right off the bat from reading
several articles in the newspaper, but sadly Netflix decided to dumb him
down a little to make things a little more plausible for Enola),
Enola's doing her own sleuthing.
She
places an ad in the personal column in a bunch of newspapers, which is a
cryptic message her mother might decipher and understand, as it was a
game between the two of them, and then she follows some of her
footsteps, to a jujitsu school and then to what looks like a very poor
warehouse district where she discovers her mother is part of the
suffragette movement.
And oh also, she's been building bombs. That too.
Enola
might be questioning if she wants to find such a woman now when the
assassin who initially attacked the Marquis back on the train (and I for
all my life thought it was Willem Dafoe, which it wasn't) is back and tries
drowning her. She manages to escape, with a little help from martial
arts and some fireworks, and now her plans change.
It's time to find the Marquis, since she's pretty sure he has no clue how to defend himself.
With
his family anxiously looking for him, she introduces herself to them as
Sherlock's assistant, a widow, which is how she meets Inspector Lestrade (who, I must say, captures the personality of book Lestrade
almost to a T). This proves bad for her as he's working for
Mycroft, so the end result of this, and her little excursion into the
vast estate where she speaks with the elderly Dowager, results in her
both finding the Marquis in a large London market working a flower
stall, as well as Lestrade finding her and delivering her back to her
brother.
Mycroft
finally manages to get her to that finishing school, where naturally
Enola does not feel either welcome or comfortable given it's so out of
what she's used to and her mother never really prepared her to be a
young lady in any way, shape or form. She's visited by Sherlock at one
point, who brings her the old pinecone toy she used to drag around the
family home when she was little, imparts some sleuthing wisdom, and then
disappears again, just in time for the Marquis to come rescue Enola.
By
this point, however, the girl's figured out something isn't right about
all these attempts on his life, and with the progressive bill about to
be voted on in the House of Lords in London, she takes the Marquis back
to his estate, where they land themselves in a shoot-out, only to come
face to face with the actual assassin, not the hired hand.
It's the grandmother.
Of
course it's the ailing Dowager, who also did away with her son because
of his progressive ideas, and her wish to preserve the greatness of
current England.
Luckily,
the Marquis makes good use of the old suits of armour on display around
the house, and he's at the House of Lords in time for a vote after
saying farewell to Enola, who declines his mother's offer to come live
with them. But it's quite obvious the two like each other and, in case of a sequel, we may see this continue (I will admit, they're kinda cute).
As
for Enola, she FINALLY receives a message from her mother, only it
turns out it's actually from Sherlock, something she deduces easily
enough (and once more we find the dumbing down of our famous sleuth
because book Sherlock would have never missed the importance of
chrysanthemums). Mycroft and Sherlock wait for her in vain, though the
brothers do decide she'll be Sherlock's ward from now on, as Mycroft
washes his hands over the whole affair.
Also, he'd be SUPER happy if Enola and the Marquis got married, because at least that'd teach both the kids some lessons!
Sherlock
spots the little pinecone, and I'm of a firm belief he also notices
Enola, hiding dressed as a paper boy, but says nothing to Mycroft and
lets her be as the two walk away together. Enola, meanwhile, is now free
to reside in London as she pleases, which was probably a whole lot
easier to do in Victorian times than it would be today for a
sixteen-year-old, actually.
She also gets one last visit.
Her mother, Eudoria.
She
explains she left because she wanted to change the world for Enola,
which was why she got involved with the suffragettes to begin with, and
that she can't return, because she's involved in some dangerous things to boot. But if Enola ever needs her, a message (or iris) will do.
And
so we conclude our movie with Enola now a young amateur sleuth in
London, a self-pronounced finder of lost souls, and getting better at riding a bicycle every day!
Hopefully
we get a series of these movies though, because that would be quite
amusing and entertaining to watch. Overall, this was a lovely piece of
filmmaking, and while a lot of people seem to complain about the
breaking of the fourth wall, I kind of liked it. It served to step away
from the traditional way movies are made, and gave us some insight into
the deductive process of young Enola, who excells at cryptography and is
quite forward-thinking for her time, like her mother.
I
also firmly believe, based on the fact Sherlock mentions Eudoria always
has a plan, that while something went terribly wrong with the family
after the father's death, the mother orchestrated this entire thing for
Enola's sake; yes, to make the world a better place, but also to
reconnect her with her older brothers and thus bring the family back
together.
She's
a Holmes, even if by marriage. This whole brilliancy runs in
the family after all, although it's interesting they decided to omit it
from Mycroft's character, as in the OG books he's described as just as
intelligent, if not even more so, than Sherlock, he simply puts it to
use in government employ.
But
the case itself is fairly easy to follow along and if you pay attention
- or if you've gone through the sleuthing ring-around before - you'll
probably be able to deduce the culprit and the reason fairly easily, not
that it takes away any of the enjoyment of actually watching the movie.
I was quite impressed by Brown's acting chops, having never seen her in
Stranger Things before or anywhere else, but I'll definitely look out
for her now if she takes on productions I might be interested in.
So
overall, this was a good, solid movie! Yes it had some additions that
speak more to modern-day times than the past (the actress for the
jujitsu class, the actor for Lestrade), but at least Netflix manages to
sprinkle these in crumbs so they don't overpower the entire storyline
and actually HELP it instead of hindering it like in so many Hollywood
productions nowadays where all you can even focus on is who's playing
what role instead of what they're doing.
The
acting for the three Holmes siblings was on-point, I think. While I was
initially hesitant about them saying they were making Holmes
sympathetic and compassionate, it really only is around Enola and he's
otherwise just as annoyingly obnoxious as before, so that turned out
rather well honestly. I didn't mind quite as much as I thought I would,
and while I acknowledge it would've been great if they hadn't needed to
also dumb him down for the sake of boosting up Enola, I suppose if
that's my only quibble I can live with it.
Mycroft was a gem. Claflin does a fantastic job at his eye-rolling and disgust over anything he dislikes. I love it.
The
whole thing came together nicely in a mix of mystery solving, action
sequences, and quiet moments where we got a chance to breathe and think
about what just happened, giving up an overall effect of a cohesive
storyline. I do feel the reason for Eudoria leaving was a little bit on
the weaker side, but honestly her influence is still felt throughout the
movie so I'm not complaining all that much.
Bottom
line, this was fun to watch, made me laugh on occasion, and while I
can't say I'm 100% into this version of Sherlock, I can very easily
enjoy him as an AU one.
Besides,
Henry Cavill in a Victorian topcoat and dark colour palette? Yes,
please. I'm shallow enough to admit as much, though I will also admit
that Brown is an emerging powerhouse.
So bring along the sequel! (And give Sherlock clothes he can move in.)
xx
*images and video not mine
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