Sherlock Holmes 2009
Jan. 1st, 2010 02:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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bechdel_testSpoilers below. If you go see this movie, don't go seeing it under the illusion that it's likely to pass the test. This is an action movie about the original detective buddy pair, set in London of the late 1800s, so it failing the test is unsurprising.
I enjoyed this film for what it was: a transformative work of the cerebral Sherlock Holmes stories, turning them into a modern action romp. (Am I the only one giggling in my sleeve at the thought of labeling this a "transformative work", a label coined by and largely reserved for the arts of female-dominated fanfiction land, and applying this to the hyper-masculine world of a Hollywood action flick? But that's very much what it does. There's no deerstalker cap! There is the violin, though, and the pipe, and the disturbed genius, and the other crazy personal habits.) The focus is very much on the relationship between Holmes and Watson, and all other concerns are peripheral to the duo. This is also set in the latter half of the 1800s, limiting the possibilities for female characters.
There are three female characters of note: Irene Adler, Mary, and Mrs. Hudson. Of these, Irene is the only one who gets significant screen time.
Mrs. Hudson appears to be present primarily because she is present in the original works, and to serve as a normal human being to be appalled by the epic socially unacceptable behavior of Holmes. (What landlady would not be appalled by a reclusive and eccentric tenant who abuses drugs, plays the violin at all hours, and shoots up the place (never mind the needle, Holmes is using a gun)?) She makes a brief appearance to help set up the starting scenario, and then is never heard from again.
Mary, Watson's fiancée, is the mechanism by which the whole state of affairs starts in this movie: she is the wedge driven between Holmes and Watson. Watson, in preparation for his upcoming marriage to Mary, is to be moving out of the rooms he shares with Holmes. Holmes, dissatisfied with this state of affairs, has entered into a two-week sulk or depressive fugue (pick your preferred interpretation). Despite Watson's ... engagement? plan to propose? Serious relationship, at any rate ... Holmes and Mary have not yet met, which is evidently a meet-the-parents level ordeal. Mary insists, over dinner, that Holmes give her the Holmes Instant Background Check, appearing to believe it some sort of parlour trick. Holmes is uncannily accurate on most points, but upon seeing evidence of a previous engagement, incorrectly assumes Mary to be a gold-digger interested in taking advantage of Watson. Hurt by the reminder of her grief for her dead previous fiancé and insulted, Mary dashes her wine in Holmes's face and storms off. Evidently this is not an uncommon occurrence when Holmes meets a girlfriend of Watson's. Mary is made of sterner stuff than most of them, however, as she returns again in Watson's company, and is confirmed to be engaged to him by the end of the movie.
Irene Adler is a thorn in the side of Holmes: a jewel thief and all-around troublemaker he cannot quite manage to bring to justice, enough so that he keeps a scrapbook of her doings. Her being a very pretty woman does not diminish Holmes's attention in the slightest. At first it appears as if she's meant to breeze in, ruffle Holmes's feathers, and then right back out again, but she's caught up in plot threads, and owes a favor to the wrong person to just be able to skip right out of town. She holds her own, kicking ass and taking names right along with Holmes and Watson. While she is overpowered and placed in physical danger to manipulate Holmes, I got the sense that she had full agency, despite being caught in the plot: she had made choices in the past that led to her being in her current position, and as she was in the current position, she was not merely a pawn, but constantly attempted to play outside the limitations laid down for her. Her life outside of the law appears to preclude her having many personal attachments, which seems to include visible female acquaintances (no, she has no local chick-friends that she hangs out with). In the end, the previous primary antagonist having been seen to (and a new one appearing: who is this Moriarty?), she and Holmes are at odds again but comfortable with this. (Snuggling!) She does not prevail against him, but neither does he turn her in (nor would she have been likely to be cooperative with that). Her prominence and general competence in the movie is not something I recall from my years-ago original reading of the source. It would have been easy to make her feel pastede-on-yey and The Fangirls Want A Mary Sue, and I got neither of those from this watching. YMMV.
Unnamed female character: the maid who encounters Holmes after Irene leaves him in the hotel room.
So there are three named female characters. Pass on level 1 and the Mo Movie Measure.
Female characters we didn't see but could have:
(More) female boarders at Mrs. Hudson's
(more) witnesses, street urchins, etc.
More female staff of the hotel, particularly a boss of the screaming maid.
More from the fellow diners when Watson, Mary, and Holmes have their doomed date
Lord Buttface's mother; Lord Buttface's father's wife (different women there) -- perhaps in flashback as some of them might have been dead (I was none too clear on the issue as there were important explosions that distracted me).
Any of the female members of the organization of which Lord Buttface's father is a member (though given the era and its mixed overprotectiveness of women, it's hard enough to meet the members of a secret society as it is, and Holmes or Watson meeting any female members might have taken more plottery).
The film fails on the second level.
Nowhere in the movie do any of the women talk to each other that I noticed, and I was looking. (It is possible that I missed something while distracted by the shiny, how exceedingly married to each other Holmes and Watson were, and explosions, but I don't think so.) While I believe both Irene and Mary may encounter Mrs. Hudson in passing in the hall of the rooming house in which Holmes and Watson stay, I don't recall any exchanges between them.
Irene and Mary never meet, let alone talk. Since I am Bad with Faces (there are stories about how bad I am, like the time I thought I had a new co-worker after she dyed her hair, the time I didn't recognizemaiden), at first I wondered if they might be the same actress, and Mary was a plot of Irene's to further mess with Holmes's poor mind, since clearly Watson being taken by Mary was perhaps the Worst Possible Thing that could happen to Holmes. At length, and in studying their noses carefully, I decided that they could not be, similar height and build and features aside. (If it had been a long game of Irene's, a blonde wig for Mary and an extensive amount of powder for Irene could have served for most of the disguise, coupled with some nose putty and the differences in wardrobe, body language, and speech.)
I've heard more than once from men that it's dangerous to let two women who know the same man well meet, because they may either hate each other or (worse) get along and then conspire. I'm hoping the fanfic will pull through here.
Third level:
Supposing Irene and Mary had met, what would they have talked about? The first and most natural thing for them to talk about by way of introduction would likely be men: they are variously attached to a pair of men who are the best of friends (who share a bed and wrestle a lot). There might be class clashes, given that a governess isn't always welcome in the highest circles, and Irene seems to make herself at home there.
Had they met before the resolution of the mystery, they might have talked about that -- but Lord Buttface was central to it, and he was a man, and any discussion of it would have been likely to prominently involve him. However, Mary did not appear to be filled in on the details of it in the same way Irene was.
Mary was traveled, as Holmes noted at the disastrous dinner. Irene was also. They could have talked about their travels. They were both educated. They could have found some topic in common from this.
Anything they were shown talking about in the movie would have to have advanced either the mystery plot or the Holmes And Watson Are It's-Complicated With Each Other plot, both of which have men as central figures. The mystery of course does require some scientific knowledge to unravel. It might not have been outside of reasonable to allow Irene and Mary an acquaintance with each other so that Irene might mention some nagging detail that Mary might have been familiar with from her particular background. But alas.
I enjoyed this film for what it was: a transformative work of the cerebral Sherlock Holmes stories, turning them into a modern action romp. (Am I the only one giggling in my sleeve at the thought of labeling this a "transformative work", a label coined by and largely reserved for the arts of female-dominated fanfiction land, and applying this to the hyper-masculine world of a Hollywood action flick? But that's very much what it does. There's no deerstalker cap! There is the violin, though, and the pipe, and the disturbed genius, and the other crazy personal habits.) The focus is very much on the relationship between Holmes and Watson, and all other concerns are peripheral to the duo. This is also set in the latter half of the 1800s, limiting the possibilities for female characters.
There are three female characters of note: Irene Adler, Mary, and Mrs. Hudson. Of these, Irene is the only one who gets significant screen time.
Mrs. Hudson appears to be present primarily because she is present in the original works, and to serve as a normal human being to be appalled by the epic socially unacceptable behavior of Holmes. (What landlady would not be appalled by a reclusive and eccentric tenant who abuses drugs, plays the violin at all hours, and shoots up the place (never mind the needle, Holmes is using a gun)?) She makes a brief appearance to help set up the starting scenario, and then is never heard from again.
Mary, Watson's fiancée, is the mechanism by which the whole state of affairs starts in this movie: she is the wedge driven between Holmes and Watson. Watson, in preparation for his upcoming marriage to Mary, is to be moving out of the rooms he shares with Holmes. Holmes, dissatisfied with this state of affairs, has entered into a two-week sulk or depressive fugue (pick your preferred interpretation). Despite Watson's ... engagement? plan to propose? Serious relationship, at any rate ... Holmes and Mary have not yet met, which is evidently a meet-the-parents level ordeal. Mary insists, over dinner, that Holmes give her the Holmes Instant Background Check, appearing to believe it some sort of parlour trick. Holmes is uncannily accurate on most points, but upon seeing evidence of a previous engagement, incorrectly assumes Mary to be a gold-digger interested in taking advantage of Watson. Hurt by the reminder of her grief for her dead previous fiancé and insulted, Mary dashes her wine in Holmes's face and storms off. Evidently this is not an uncommon occurrence when Holmes meets a girlfriend of Watson's. Mary is made of sterner stuff than most of them, however, as she returns again in Watson's company, and is confirmed to be engaged to him by the end of the movie.
Irene Adler is a thorn in the side of Holmes: a jewel thief and all-around troublemaker he cannot quite manage to bring to justice, enough so that he keeps a scrapbook of her doings. Her being a very pretty woman does not diminish Holmes's attention in the slightest. At first it appears as if she's meant to breeze in, ruffle Holmes's feathers, and then right back out again, but she's caught up in plot threads, and owes a favor to the wrong person to just be able to skip right out of town. She holds her own, kicking ass and taking names right along with Holmes and Watson. While she is overpowered and placed in physical danger to manipulate Holmes, I got the sense that she had full agency, despite being caught in the plot: she had made choices in the past that led to her being in her current position, and as she was in the current position, she was not merely a pawn, but constantly attempted to play outside the limitations laid down for her. Her life outside of the law appears to preclude her having many personal attachments, which seems to include visible female acquaintances (no, she has no local chick-friends that she hangs out with). In the end, the previous primary antagonist having been seen to (and a new one appearing: who is this Moriarty?), she and Holmes are at odds again but comfortable with this. (Snuggling!) She does not prevail against him, but neither does he turn her in (nor would she have been likely to be cooperative with that). Her prominence and general competence in the movie is not something I recall from my years-ago original reading of the source. It would have been easy to make her feel pastede-on-yey and The Fangirls Want A Mary Sue, and I got neither of those from this watching. YMMV.
Unnamed female character: the maid who encounters Holmes after Irene leaves him in the hotel room.
So there are three named female characters. Pass on level 1 and the Mo Movie Measure.
Female characters we didn't see but could have:
(More) female boarders at Mrs. Hudson's
(more) witnesses, street urchins, etc.
More female staff of the hotel, particularly a boss of the screaming maid.
More from the fellow diners when Watson, Mary, and Holmes have their doomed date
Lord Buttface's mother; Lord Buttface's father's wife (different women there) -- perhaps in flashback as some of them might have been dead (I was none too clear on the issue as there were important explosions that distracted me).
Any of the female members of the organization of which Lord Buttface's father is a member (though given the era and its mixed overprotectiveness of women, it's hard enough to meet the members of a secret society as it is, and Holmes or Watson meeting any female members might have taken more plottery).
The film fails on the second level.
Nowhere in the movie do any of the women talk to each other that I noticed, and I was looking. (It is possible that I missed something while distracted by the shiny, how exceedingly married to each other Holmes and Watson were, and explosions, but I don't think so.) While I believe both Irene and Mary may encounter Mrs. Hudson in passing in the hall of the rooming house in which Holmes and Watson stay, I don't recall any exchanges between them.
Irene and Mary never meet, let alone talk. Since I am Bad with Faces (there are stories about how bad I am, like the time I thought I had a new co-worker after she dyed her hair, the time I didn't recognize
maiden), at first I wondered if they might be the same actress, and Mary was a plot of Irene's to further mess with Holmes's poor mind, since clearly Watson being taken by Mary was perhaps the Worst Possible Thing that could happen to Holmes. At length, and in studying their noses carefully, I decided that they could not be, similar height and build and features aside. (If it had been a long game of Irene's, a blonde wig for Mary and an extensive amount of powder for Irene could have served for most of the disguise, coupled with some nose putty and the differences in wardrobe, body language, and speech.) I've heard more than once from men that it's dangerous to let two women who know the same man well meet, because they may either hate each other or (worse) get along and then conspire. I'm hoping the fanfic will pull through here.
Third level:
Supposing Irene and Mary had met, what would they have talked about? The first and most natural thing for them to talk about by way of introduction would likely be men: they are variously attached to a pair of men who are the best of friends (who share a bed and wrestle a lot). There might be class clashes, given that a governess isn't always welcome in the highest circles, and Irene seems to make herself at home there.
Had they met before the resolution of the mystery, they might have talked about that -- but Lord Buttface was central to it, and he was a man, and any discussion of it would have been likely to prominently involve him. However, Mary did not appear to be filled in on the details of it in the same way Irene was.
Mary was traveled, as Holmes noted at the disastrous dinner. Irene was also. They could have talked about their travels. They were both educated. They could have found some topic in common from this.
Anything they were shown talking about in the movie would have to have advanced either the mystery plot or the Holmes And Watson Are It's-Complicated With Each Other plot, both of which have men as central figures. The mystery of course does require some scientific knowledge to unravel. It might not have been outside of reasonable to allow Irene and Mary an acquaintance with each other so that Irene might mention some nagging detail that Mary might have been familiar with from her particular background. But alas.