Sherlock Holmes (PG)

Director Guy Richie draws on Conan Doyle’s moments of high drama to bring us a new kind of Holmes – action hero Holmes.

We pick up the story as Watson is about to move out of their shared Baker Street apartment to marry and settle down in the suburbs. But there is one great adventure left for the duo after a villain returns from the dead to wreak havoc across Victorian London.

The relationship between Robert Downey Jr as a devil-may-care Holmes and Jude Law as the bullish, heroic Watson is a fizzing success. And while lovers of the case books will have to get their heads round all the character changes, this non-stop action adventure is a joy.

4 stars