Holmes and Watson Review

Never has a film made it to theaters that is so devoid of comedy that wouldn't be rivaled by the dud "Holmes and Watson," the new high-concept movie that stars Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly. It's not just humorless, but it's a feature length film where nothing happens, nothing interesting at least. It is a total wash, a dry example that having stars who were funny in other comedies does not mean they'll be funny in all comedies.

I laughed two times during it's brief runtime, once out loud and the other on the inside, my self-esteem ashamed to let anyone in the inexplicably packed theater know my funny bone was just ever so slightly tickled. It's not just unfunny, it's spineless, tacky, and being released on Christmas day feels like something The Grinch organized.

The entire experience feels as if no script was written, and the cast were told "hey, here's the plot for this scene, adlib it," and then they took the first take. Our leads resort to screaming lines over and over again, in a desperate attempt to get a laugh hoping that repetition and yelling will somehow make the witless punchline actually funny.

The plot is an excuse for the most senseless sight gags, poor puns, sigh-inducing slapstick, and belated Trump jokes to berate your senses. The one time the unlucky group of attendees heard my cackle was when tertiary character  Millie (Lauren Lapkus) is introduced as being raised by cats, which explains why her eyes are bugged so far out of their sockets. Why I laughed is beyond me, probably a pent-up laugh that my sense of humor prepped when it heard I was seeing a comedy. I would have probably laughed at anything, given how late the chuckle came in the film's running time; I'm just glad it wasn't at one of the many puke or "John C. Reilly is ugly" jokes. But in all seriousness, the actual plot concerns the title two trying to stop who is believed to be Moriarty (a very thankless Ralph Fiennes) from assassinating the queen. Not much in the narrative department.

The problem with a comedy like this is not in concept, it takes a "The Naked Gun" approach to detective fiction, a genre seemingly ripe for riffing. It takes an idea for a joke then goes further, the notion being that "once is funny, 5 times is funnier." But that doesn't work if the joke isn't funny to begin with. Take the scene when Watson and Holmes think they killed the queen (while taking a, sigh, "selfie"), her guards unaware and just outside their door. They try shoving her in a trunk, jumping on the lid when she doesn't fit, and it goes on and on; push and push the duo does, and she just doesn't fit. Funny right?

I'd share another example, but the film so passively escapes from your conscience the second a scene ends that it would require me paying another inexcusable ten bucks to see this trash again, and I refuse. No force on Earth or in heaven could get me to provide the film makers with any incentive, monetary or otherwise, to keep director/writer Etan Cohen working outside the world of also-ran sitcoms or greeting cards.