With 2009’s Sherlock Holmes, Warner Bros and director Guy Ritchie injected a dose of speed-ramping, villain-pummeling testosterone to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s legendary investigator. Like all buddy cop-style movies, however, it was fundamentally a love story between two men. In this case, Robert Downey Jr.’s Holmes and Jude Law as Dr. Watson, who both had love interests played by Rachel McAdams and Kelly Reilly, but whose contentious, subtextually homoerotic friendship was the engine driving the whole film. A new image from the upcoming sequel, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows promises that though the two may bicker like an old married couple, this is one relationship that has retained its primal heat.
The two lean in close, almost as if to kiss, while a phallic substitute (the cigar) unifies the space between them in this image, which is courtesy of MTV. As part of their Fall Movie Preview, Music Television has plenty of new images from various films, as well as an interview with Jared Harris, who plays Holmes’ archnemesis Professor Moriarty in A Game of Shadows and should be familiar Lane Price on Mad Men.
If, for some inconceivable reason, you’re in disbelief as to the subtext of Sherlock Holmes, I present this dialogue exchange outside of its original context:
Watson: Get that out of my face.
Holmes: It’s not in your face, it’s in my hand.
Watson: Get what’s in your hand out of my face.
Based on the sequel trailer, that exact exchange will appear in the sequel, as well. […]
Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows continues the love story in theaters on December 16th.
[SOURCE]Another case of “NEW PHOTO - oh wait nevermind” but this article.
“… the movie-going public will decide the extent to which Mr. Law and I will be enjoying each other’s company.” [x]
Unbuttoning Watson’s waistcoats was an art Holmes had yet to master.
(Notice the tea service: Look familiar?)
