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Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (12A)

Action, Adventure, Crime

Sherlock Holmes and his sidekick Dr. Watson join forces to outwit and bring down their fiercest adversary, Professor Moriarty.


The critical consensus

Holmes and Watson are happy and their escapades play out with such grace and brio that the fun is infectious.

****(*)Xan Brooks, The Guardian, 13/12/2011

A sequel confident in what it's about - bigger, better, funnier, without stretching the joke.

****(*)Ian Nathan, Empire Online, 12/12/2011

With its cross-dressing lead, hissable villain and oodles of double entendre, Sherlock Holmes: A Game Of Shadows is the closest action cinema has ever come to pantomime – and that’s meant as a sincere compliment.

***(*)(*)Robbie Collin, The Telegraph, 13/12/2011

Faster, funnier and even more bromantic than the original, this far from stately Holmes delivers piping hot entertainment at a furious lick.

****(*)Neil Smith, Total Film, 09/12/2011

Ritchie is smart enough to pull out some effectively Holmesian twists in the film’s conclusion, but in terms of continuing the balance achieved in the first film, it is a case of too little, too late.

***(*)(*)Paul Gallagher, The List, 13/12/2011

It's not all boys and their toys, there are some cute visual gags as well, but the action is paramount. You know the Ritchie methods by now, and in the legend of Holmes he has found a happy home for them.

***(*)(*)Alison Rowat, The Herald, 15/12/2011

One of the year’s most satisfying cocktails of action, comedy and drama.

Oliver Good, Little White Lies, 14/12/2011

Director Guy Ritchie again plays out the fights in super slow motion, a highly stylised approach that renders the movie exciting because it is boisterous and noisy, not because it is especially imaginative or clever.

Paul Greenwood, Evening Times, 15/12/2011

It's all great fun, and a sure bet for those seeking thrills and spills and laughs this Christmas: elementary.

****(*)Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian, 15/12/2011

There are many minor quibbles you could make about A Game Of Shadows but generally it is a great, swaggering, globe-trotting slice of entertainment to divert and delight on a stormy winter’s night. Sometimes that is all you want from a trip to the cinema.

****(*)Allan Hunter, Daily Express, 16/12/2011

A Game of Shadows only becomes enjoyable when it pauses the plot and gives the stage to its performers, or rather, performer: Downey Jr sports with the role like a jazz musician noodling in and out of a tune.

***(*)(*)Anthony Quinn, The Independent, 16/12/2011

As it stands, it has more in common with the Pirates of the Caribbean sequels than its tightly plotted inspiration.

**(*)(*)(*)Alistair Harkness, The Scotsman, 16/12/2011

The picture is frantic and lavish enough to distract and maybe it will hit the bullseye with it’s young target audience but the opportunity to craft a celluloid action-hero in Holmes with charm, intrigue and longevity appears to have now been squandered.

**(*)(*)(*)Henry Fitzherbert, Daily Express, 16/12/2011

In between some spectacular set-pieces, there’s a surplus of tedious chatter and the first 20 minutes are so breathlessly told it’s hard to know quite what’s going on.

***(*)(*)David Edwards, Daily Record, 16/12/2011

Guy Ritchie's second Sherlock Holmes film improves on the first one in every respect.

Nicholas Barber, The Independent on Sunday, 18/12/2011

Sherlock Holmes is transformed into a man of action in Guy Ritchie's latest reimagining of the Victorian sleuth.

Philip French, The Observer, 18/12/2011

Robert Downey Jr is still a great fit as the mordant detective whose mind and mouth outpaces the script he’s working with.

***(*)(*)Siobhan Synnot, The Scotsman, 20/12/2011


Features about Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (12A)

Robert Downey Jr, Sherlock Holmes and the sequel struggle

Mark Savage, BBC, 14/12/2011

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (12A)Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

Where and when?

General release. Check local listings for show times.

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