Held Prisoner in Hampton Roads

Sherlock Holmes?

. . . a pity, my dear Watson.

Mrs. B and I wandered out in the Saturday evening cold to see Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law make an attempt at Holmes and Watson.

Bad idea.

It proved a feeble attempt.

This Guy Ritchie film (didn't he used to be Mr. Madonna?) recast Downey's Holmes as a down-sized, Victorian Arnold Swarzenegger, and Law's Watson as a Kato-esque sidekick (pun intended.)

A shirtless Holmes in a bareknuckle pit fight? Kicking ass and taking names? Watson subduing a 400 lbs French giant with some type of Gracie juijutsu choke hold? Please!

Yep, it was all there - along with thundering explosions, slashing swords, gunfights, un-ending fisticuffs and a hand-to-hand duel atop the yet unfinished Tower Bridge.

I'm guessing our great unwashed, unread youth will flock to this one, but Downey is not MY Sherlock Holmes. In the great authors' home in the sky, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle must be mixing a 20% solution, for 2% will be much too weak to block this travesty from his brain.

The movie set itself up for a sequel, but I don't care. I won't be seeing it.

Basil Rathbone is MY Sherlock Holmes.

Robert Downey Jr. will never be.