Looking more like Sir Cassidy and the Duke of Sundance than the more urbane Holmes and staid Watson we’ve always seen before, these new shots from USA Today give us a sexier detective and brawlier sidekick.
Did Ritchie consider that he might be asking for trouble by messing with a literary icon?
“I didn’t really think of the downside as much as I thought about the upside,” the filmmaker says. “I was a Holmes fan when I was a child. They are the first stories I remember. I also liked the approach the studio was coming at. To me, it was the perfect segue from small independent films to something more ambitious and quintessentially English. So I’ve got my cake and I can eat it.”
Not that it hasn’t been a challenge for cast and crew both here and in England as they attempt to drag a well-etched 19th-century archetype, personified by a suave if snooty Basil Rathbone in 14 films in the ’30s and ’40s, into the 21st century for an action-hero makeover.
“Sherlock was perceived as stuffy and old-fashioned,” says Lionel Wigram, a producer on the Harry Potter series who initiated the revival about a decade ago. “I thought the TV ones (including, most recently, those starring Jeremy Brett and Rupert Everett) were wonderful, but in a Masterpiece Theatre kind of way. It felt like there was a great opportunity to do something bigger than that.”
More photos after the cut.
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