Enola Holmes
Surprisingly, Netflix delivers a clever, feminist, self-aware and enormously entertaining riff on the Sherlock Holmes brand.
Tomboy tomfoolery: Millie Bobby Brown
You learn something
every day. Apparently Sherlock Holmes had a younger sister. As chronicled in Nancy
Springer’s six Enola Holmes Mysteries
(2006-2010), Enola was a spirited, independent and resourceful problem solver, every
bit as astute as her much older brothers Sherlock and Mycroft. Brought up by
her mother in a spectacular house in the English countryside, Enola was home
schooled in the sciences, martial arts, archery, sport and, from a ridiculously early
age, chess. She was also a rabid reader and devoured the works of Shakespeare, Thackeray,
John Locke and, germanely, the literature of Mary Wollstonecraft. Her mother was
everything to her and then, one day, she vanished.
Much of Enola’s
background is related direct to camera by the film’s 16-year-old producer,
Millie Bobby Brown, who plays Enola, as she cycles in her bloomers pell-mell
through the fields and lanes of Victorian England. If ever a narrative was
given a propulsive start, this is it, as the film’s 122 minutes speed along at
the rate of knots, aided by Adam Bosman’s athletic editing and Daniel Pemberton’s
sweeping score. Indeed, Enola Holmes
has a lightness of touch characteristic of its helmer, Harry Bradbeer, who directed
Fleabag and two episodes of the
original Killing Eve. And like Phoebe
Waller-Bridge, Millie Bobby is not above arching an eyebrow directly at the
viewer and, on one occasion, asking us “Do you have any ideas?”
Fearless,
ungainly and feisty, Enola (‘Alone’ spelled backwards, the better to reinforce
the girl’s independence) is a delightful heroine, winningly played by the young
actress-producer with a mischievous bravado. At the time – 1900 – women were
far from independent and Jack Thorne’s screenplay artfully blends fiction with
history as it transpires that Enola’s mother, Eudoria (Helena Bonham Carter, of
Suffragette fame), is involved in the
suffragette movement. Sherlock (Henry Cavill, adding yet another iconic
character to his portfolio), is too privileged, white and male to take such
silliness seriously, giving the Holmesian mythos a pertinent, modern twist.
And, of course, as Nancy Springer’s novels are aimed at young adult girls, Enola
outwits her brother more than once.
The film is
rich with incidental comic detail and at times it is (what some critics might
describe) “laugh-out-loud funny.” There are wonderful supporting turns from the
likes of Frances de la Tour and Fiona Shaw, while old Londinium is brought
vividly to life with state-of-the-art CGI. It’s hard to believe that with so
many re-inventions of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s immortal detective – from Gene
Wilder's The Adventure of Sherlock
Holmes' Smarter Brother (1975) to CBS TV’s modern update Elementary – that there was room for yet
another: and one that manages to be so constantly inventive, touching and
ticklish. More please.
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Cast: Millie Bobby Brown, Sam Claflin, Adeel
Akhtar, Fiona Shaw, Frances de la Tour, Louis Partridge, Burn Gorman, Susie
Wokoma, Henry Cavill, Helena Bonham Carter, Claire Rushbrook, David Bamber, Hattie
Morahan, Sofia Stavrinou, Ellie Haddington, Paul Copley, David Kirkbride, Mary
Roscoe, Esther Coles.
Dir Harry Bradbeer, Pro Millie Bobby Brown, Paige Brown and Mary Parent, Alex Garcia, Ali
Mendes, Screenplay Jack Thorne, Ph Giles Nuttgens, Pro Des Michael Carlin, Ed
Adam Bosman, Music Daniel Pemberton, Costumes Consolata Boyle.
Legendary Pictures/PCMA Productions-Netflix.
122 mins. UK/USA. 2020. Rel: 23 September 2020. Available on Netflix. Cert. 12.