Sherlock Holmes
Warner Bros. Pictures | Release Date: December 25, 2009 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
57
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 34 Critic Reviews
Positive:
17
Mixed:
13
Negative:
4
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
New York Daily NewsJoe Neumaier
Downey has a winning take on Holmes: He's always on. Read full review
75
PremiereNick Starkey
Hey, remember “fun”? If you’re sick of the apocalypse and tortured anti-heroes, then you need to see Sherlock Holmes. It’s a blast from start to finish. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
The less I thought about Sherlock Holmes, the more I liked "Sherlock Holmes." Yet another classic hero has been fed into the f/x mill, emerging as a modern superman. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeTy Burr
It pleases me to report, then, that Downey brings his brain, his wit, and his gift for intelligent underplaying, even as he understands he has been hired to play Sherlock Holmes, action hero. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubKeith Phipps
This is very much a Sherlock Holmes movie for the blockbuster era. Read full review
70
VarietyTodd McCarthy
Ritchie has never worked on a scale anything approaching this before and, while some of the directorial affectations are distracting, he keeps the action humming. Read full review
70
The New YorkerDavid Denby
Challenged by Downey’s energy, Jude Law, who often seems aimless in his movies, comes fully up to speed. He’s virile and quick-witted, and his Watson, if not Holmes’s equal in brainpower, comes close to him in daring. Their repartee evokes the banter of lovers in a screwball comedy; they flirt outrageously but chastely. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
There's a mystery at the heart of Sherlock Holmes, and it's not the one the great master of detection has been called on to solve. It's how a film that has so many good things going for it has turned out to be solid but not spectacular. Read full review
70
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
The movie as a whole is clever, and conspicuously overwrought. But Mr. Downey's performance is elegantly wrought; he's as quick-witted as his legendary character, and blithely funny in the lovers' spats—all right, the mystery-lovers' spats—that Holmes keeps having with Jude Law's witty Dr. Watson. Read full review
70
The New York TimesA.O. Scott
There are worse things than loutish, laddish cool, and as a series of poses and stunts, Sherlock Holmes is intermittently diverting. Read full review
70
SalonStephanie Zacharek
Entertaining in a glossy, mindless way. Read full review
67
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
Sherlock Holmes is an odd amalgam, a top-heavy light entertainment that keeps throwing things at you and doesn't seem too concerned with whether they stick. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleMarc Savlov
Here's hoping that younger members of the audience will seek out Conan Doyle's original stories to further explore Holmes' official amanuensis, Dr. John Watson, whose brilliant case studies regarding his friend, roommate, and fellow rationalist are the stuff dreams are made of. Read full review
63
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
The reason Sherlock Holmes fails at least as often as it succeeds is because more effort and attention was lavished upon the concept than upon the script. Given a worthy story, Downey's Holmes might have been memorable. Here, he's an interesting character in search of a worthwhile story. Read full review
63
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe Williams
The result is only half as hip as hoped. Yes, this Holmes is leaner and meaner, and Watson (Jude Law) is nearly his equal. But there’s still something fussy about the result, as if bobbies had broken up the party at 11:59. Read full review
63
USA TodayClaudia Puig
Sherlock Holmes has been reimagined with fighting skills as potent as his intellectual acumen. Read full review
63
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike Scott
Ritchie and company spend too much time being cute and not enough time being clever, resulting in a one-dimensional comic-book version of Doyle's detectives. Read full review
60
EmpireWilliam Thomas
A fun, action-packed reintroduction to Conan Doyle's classic characters. Part Two should provide more in the way of scope. Read full review
60
NPRBob Mondello
In short, Ritchie's come up with precisely what you'd expect of him — a pumped-up, anachronistically modern Sherlock Holmes designed for the ADD crowd. Expect a sequel. Or six. Read full review
60
New York Magazine (Vulture)David Edelstein
By now we’ve seen so many good, bad, and indifferent Sherlocks that it’s almost a relief to get something different, however wrongheaded. And there’s no such thing as too much Downey. Read full review
50
Rolling StonePeter Travers
Ritchie is all about the whooshing and headbanging, leaving no space between Holmes' words to savor their meaning. Downey is irresistible. The movie, not so much. Read full review
50
Village VoiceJ. Hoberman
As over-emphatic as one might expect from the ham-fisted Guy Ritchie, this resurrection of the world's most famous detective is a dank, noisy affair. Read full review
50
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
Not even Sherlock Holmes could make much sense out of the overplotted, murky mess that is "Sherlock Holmes," although Arthur Conan Doyle's legendarily brainy detective would probably never buy a ticket to a movie as elephant-footed as this one. Read full review
50
Philadelphia InquirerSteven Rea
With a clamorous soundtrack and a whirl of elaborate chases and busily choreographed fight scenes, this is Sherlock Holmes with Attention Deficit Disorder. Read full review
50
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
Despite some arresting visual flourishes and Downey’s inherent likeability, it’s nearly incoherent both as cinema and as story. No, this isn’t your grandfather’s or your father’s Sherlock Holmes, but if theirs featured Basil Rathbone or Jeremy Brett in the lead, it was better by miles. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
Guy Ritchie is the worst screenwriter in the world, but, to be fair, he is not the worst director. He is only the worst director of the people who actually get to make movies. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Liam Lacey
Guy Ritchie's Holmes reboot feels both too complicated and too elementary, dear Watson. Read full review
42
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
This is certainly the grubbiest Holmes in movie history. Read full review
40
The Hollywood ReporterKirk Honeycutt
Sherlock Holmes goes wrong in many ways except for one -- at the boxoffice. Read full review
40
Time OutJoshua Rothkopf
This is the ultimate sin of the film, generically helmed by lad-auteur Guy Ritchie: Logic seems to be thrown out the window in order to make room for clashes on a partially completed Tower Bridge. It’s way too elementary. Read full review
38
Chicago TribuneMichael Phillips
It's a serious drag to see how Ritchie has turned Holmes and Dr. Watson into a couple of garden-variety thugs. Read full review
38
New York PostKyle Smith
Sherlock Holmes dumbs down a century-old synonym for intelligence with S&M gags, witless sarcasm, murky bombast and twirling action-hero moves that belong in a ninja flick. Read full review
38
Washington PostMichael O'Sullivan
This "Holmes" is just about as silly as it awesome. At times, Ritchie and company try so hard to make sure this isn't your father's "Sherlock Holmes" that it comes across as, well, cartoonish. Read full review
30
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
The very idea of handing him over to professional lad Guy Ritchie (who directed Snatch, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels), to be played as a punch-throwing quipster by Robert Downey Jr., is so profoundly stupid one can only step back in dismay. Read full review
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