Critic Reviews

McKellen is brilliant throughout, his piercing blue eyes revealing the gallantry of youth and the sadness of a life’s worth of memories slipping further away. His understated and charming approach to the role makes it all the more potent and engaging.

Mr. Holmes is about how the past defines us. It is also very much about regret and trying to put things right.

Mr. Holmes is not so much the story of Holmes' last case, as the story of his last choice: whether to go gentle, or whether to rage against the dying of the light.

The more vital subject of Mr. Holmes turns out to be our need for stories themselves and, in particular, the role of fiction as an escape from the pain and loss of everyday life.

Anyone expecting opera and opium will be disappointed. But a majestic McKellen rescues a safe script, giving us a fresh look at an icon even the most casual viewer will be (over)familar with.

Shining is nothing new for McKellen, a brilliant actor, and it's interesting to see how he and Condon portray Holmes' faculties at different times.

Maneuvering shrewdly within the boundaries of the traditional canon and aided by the impeccable performance of Ian McKellen, Bill Condon directs an elegant puzzler that presents the sage of Baker Street dealing with the one thing he's never had to contend with before: his own emotions.

Sherlock Holmes is totally cool again, which warms my dorky heart.

In an age of flashier adaptations of Conan Doyle’s classic literary character, Condon's film might be appreciated as a refreshingly old-fashioned outing, even with its own variations on the character in mind.

Mr. Holmes is an elegiac, understated tale of The Detective in Winter, a rare thing in its own right.