Once again Messrs Downey and Law reprise their roles of Holmes and Watson. One would be forgiven if perhaps the editor was being paid by the frame as this tends to spend a lot of time, a lot of t i m e, in scenes which IMHO could have been much shorter and retained all the impact, if not more.

On the other hand, A Game of Shadows is beautiful to watch so the editor can be forgiven for not wanting to leave a single frame on the cutting room floor. It does mean the Director’s Cut, a marketing ploy of pure genius if ever there were one, will be longer only in the extras as opposed to the feature itself.

This movie wraps together too many of the printed version stories including the series ending which is considered by many an expert as the finest literary conclusion every put to page in modern time, with a rather big hat tip to Bill Shakespear’s Romeo and Juliet. Someone at the studio obviously thought ending this cash cow prior to making a trilogy (and collector’s edition box set complete with actor, director and producer commentary on Blueray in time for Xmas ’12) too soon was not an idea to that would gain favour with his/her higher ups. Said exec aded what looks like two pages of script to the end to ensure a) a Hollywood ending, b) increase in Christmas cash revenues which leads to c) not holding entirely true to Arthur Conan Doyle’s original.

As I have said before to friend and foe, Jared Harris as Professor James Moriarty is not good casting. Moriarty was brilliant. And evil. And vindictive and well quite insane. While Mr Harris is a fine actor, at the top of his craft and career with starring roles in Mad Man and other production, he doesn’t bring ‘it’ to this role. Again, I refer you to Philip Seymour Hoffman as the evil mastermind in the third instalment of Mission: Impossible. Pure genius. Blood curdling with nothing more than the slightest of looks. And the right tone of voice.

Three and a half psychopaths out of 5