Mining the same paydirt as the first outing, the second Sherlock Holmes film struggles to find gold but still manages to be worth the effort.

Game of Shadows picks up through lines hinted in the first film and brings Holmes (Robert Downey Jr)  into direct conflict with the character’s greatest adversary, Professor Moriarty (Jared Harris), who is embroiled in a complicated plot to control weapons and medicine while exacerbating international conflicts by staging elaborate terrorist bombings. Holmes re-teams with his sidekick Watson following Watson’s (Jude Law) marriage and subsequent attempt by Mortiarty to punish Holmes’s meddling by attacking his friend. Following the trail to Moriarty, the duo joins forces with a gypsy woman (Noomi Rapace) who’s brother has become embroiled in the plot and the three engage in a violent and treacherous game of chess with Moriarty in a race against time to stop him.

Game of Shadows is kind of an odd duck in that it is a fun and exciting outing but is also somewhat frustrating and less satisfying than the first installment.  There is a feeling of retread here as the story unfolds in much the same way as the first. Breakneck action interspersed with mystery solving elements and highlights to the bromance between Holmes and Watson, but the way it is presented here doesn’t feel particularly cohesive.

It feels like there are two movies going on here. One is an intense action film with brilliant choreography and gorgeous slow motion photography and the other is an intellectual thriller in which two brilliant adversaries square off against each other in a battle of wits. Both movies do what they do very well and very successfully but put together as a whole, the film feels uneven and it is hard to settle into exactly what you are seeing.  This isn’t to say that the film is unwatchable, it is just not as good as it could and should have been.

The best and most satisfying moments come from the scenes in which Holmes and Moriarty square off directly. The writing in these cases is top notch and the performances really sing. There is a aloof goofiness to Holmes that permeates his character in these films and that drops away slightly and offers us a more serious, if more arrogant, Holmes which is nice to see. As much as I liked Mark Strong in the first film, Harris’s Moriarty feels much more formidable and you get a real sense that because he lacks the moral compunction of Holmes he is ultimately superior tactically as he has all available options available, which is, of course, the point of Moriarty in the first place. Given how good these scenes are, I would have have liked to have had more of these and less of the action.

As much as I preferred the mystery/battle of wits aspects of the film, the action sequences were still very well put together. The convention of Holmes anticipating the action before it happens and then carrying out the right moves is in full effect but the action here proves to be a bit much for even his deductive reasoning magic. The stakes feel a lot higher here as the damage inflicted in the fights and torture are lasting and put the effected characters at varying degrees of disadvantage. This is a nice grounding to the film when there are a lot of crazy things going on that might damage your suspension of disbelief. Still, those moments are very well shot and put together so you may be inclined to let some of the more nonsensical elements go in favor of just having fun.

Some elements, however, have worn out their welcome a bit and are becoming detracting distractions from the good stuff. Holmes constant costumes and disguises felt way too much like Fletch to be terribly credible here and after the first couple I found myself rolling my eyes. Again, the action, while well done, got to be a bit much and I think threw off the balance of the film. Adjusting the ratio would have done wonders for the film.

Rapace’s gypsy character Sim was also a let down for me as I didn’t feel her inclusion did anything to elevate the material and she felt more like a tagalong than a valuable member of the trio. I am not sure where to lay the blame here because the character wasn’t written with much to do and that is what Rapace did with the role. I was fairly unimpressed with her performance as she looked pretty bored most of the time but again, that might just be all the script had to offer her.

The remainder of the performances were good. Downey Jr was again a very fun Holmes with Law’s Watson acting as the perfect foil for him. As mentioned above, Harris’s Moriarty adds the right amount of gravitas to be formidable and doesn’t feel the need to overdo any of it. Stephen Fry turns in a great performance as Holmes’s brother Mycroft, a character apparently based somewhat on Oscar Wilde.

A lot of people criticize these Holmes movies for their modern sensibilities and the liberties taken with the character but I reject that criticism completely. Certain elements are turned up for the films but the overall feel of the character and some of the particular details are more accurate to the stories than previous filmed efforts. That being said, I can understand how, if your primary experience with Holmes is Basil Rathbone, these films can be jarring. This installment doesn’t do much to make those viewers feel better and indeed goes the opposite direction. If you didn’t care for the more boisterous elements of the first one, you are not going to find a more toned down picture here.

Conclusion [8.0 out of 10]

This is a hard film to assign a number grade to as there are elements that I loved and elements that I hated. Overall, however, I think the good outweighs the bad and is worth a look for fans of the original. There isn’t much here to change your mind if you hated that one but there is a lot to like otherwise even if the whole thing is a bit much to take with a healthy dose of uneven narrative. Game of Shadows doesn’t do as much right as the original film but it does enough right to be worth checking out in the theater where the action and booming soundtrack can be properly appreciated on the big screen.