![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Work is weird. My social life is weird. I've been feeling weird. And, that's really about it.
Oh, I read some more of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Hlomes stories I hadn't gotten to yet, and saw the movie over the weekend. It was interesting to compare the things that I noticed and the feelings that were evoked for me, and compare those to movie reviews, by friends and by the mainstream media. I don't get to do a lot of that, either because no one I personally know gets around to seeing movies like this before I do, or because there isn't generally a lot of variation in familiarity with the source material when people I know have things to say about a movie.
So, it seems like the mainstream media did their general 'it is what it is' type reviews, with some small nods to fans of the books or older movies, and a couple of tidbits about the filming and special effects. Which you would expect, since they were talking about the movie itself. Reviews by friends seemed to fall into 3 distinct catagories: 1) I saw this movie, this is what I thought of it. 2) I saw this movie because I liked a bunch of older Holmes movies, and the film-making blah-blah-blah. 3) I saw this movie because I am a fan of the books, and this is what I thought of the movie, with a literary discussion and some comparison.
I think I found some points to agree with in everyone's commentary; although considering the victorian fascination with illusion, I find the notion that modern tech is somehow incompatible with telling tales of that era facsinating. I heard that particular comment from a couple of people, and not even people of a certain age (not even people of the same age, so it's not an era issue). My point of view would be along the lines that if they could have, they would have; and it's not like the director added anything too far-fetched.
The romance & bromance/homoerotic-overtones, or lack therof, got a wide array of interpretations and reactions. I found those comments also to be enlightening. Some people went back to the original stories, and came to wildly varying conclusions. Some people went back to history, and then threw in their own interpretations of what the director was going for. All around, it was fascinating to see the movie and hold up my own lense to it, and compare that with how others interpreted the story.
It's not often you get a story bassed on source material where a small group of people have a great deal of knowledge of it, and most people have at least an idea of where the thing comes from. Probably Shakespeare's comedies, or the Fleming James Bond novels would be similar situations, although the James bond novels are so utterly far removed from the films at this point there's no comparison. I'm not going to put Lord of the Rings on the list, since there have been so few major motion pictures based on them. Possibly the Narnia Chronicles, but most of the Narnia interpretations (to be fair I've only seen the 2 newest films and the first BBC miniseries) seem to be interpreting from the same point of view, so I don't think that's a fair comparison.
Okay, I'll quit rambling now. Carry on.
Oh, I read some more of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Hlomes stories I hadn't gotten to yet, and saw the movie over the weekend. It was interesting to compare the things that I noticed and the feelings that were evoked for me, and compare those to movie reviews, by friends and by the mainstream media. I don't get to do a lot of that, either because no one I personally know gets around to seeing movies like this before I do, or because there isn't generally a lot of variation in familiarity with the source material when people I know have things to say about a movie.
So, it seems like the mainstream media did their general 'it is what it is' type reviews, with some small nods to fans of the books or older movies, and a couple of tidbits about the filming and special effects. Which you would expect, since they were talking about the movie itself. Reviews by friends seemed to fall into 3 distinct catagories: 1) I saw this movie, this is what I thought of it. 2) I saw this movie because I liked a bunch of older Holmes movies, and the film-making blah-blah-blah. 3) I saw this movie because I am a fan of the books, and this is what I thought of the movie, with a literary discussion and some comparison.
I think I found some points to agree with in everyone's commentary; although considering the victorian fascination with illusion, I find the notion that modern tech is somehow incompatible with telling tales of that era facsinating. I heard that particular comment from a couple of people, and not even people of a certain age (not even people of the same age, so it's not an era issue). My point of view would be along the lines that if they could have, they would have; and it's not like the director added anything too far-fetched.
The romance & bromance/homoerotic-overtones, or lack therof, got a wide array of interpretations and reactions. I found those comments also to be enlightening. Some people went back to the original stories, and came to wildly varying conclusions. Some people went back to history, and then threw in their own interpretations of what the director was going for. All around, it was fascinating to see the movie and hold up my own lense to it, and compare that with how others interpreted the story.
It's not often you get a story bassed on source material where a small group of people have a great deal of knowledge of it, and most people have at least an idea of where the thing comes from. Probably Shakespeare's comedies, or the Fleming James Bond novels would be similar situations, although the James bond novels are so utterly far removed from the films at this point there's no comparison. I'm not going to put Lord of the Rings on the list, since there have been so few major motion pictures based on them. Possibly the Narnia Chronicles, but most of the Narnia interpretations (to be fair I've only seen the 2 newest films and the first BBC miniseries) seem to be interpreting from the same point of view, so I don't think that's a fair comparison.
Okay, I'll quit rambling now. Carry on.
