Sherlock Holmes (film)/Trivia

The 2009 film

• Aluminum Christmas Trees:
  • Holmes' sunglasses are of the period.
  • As is Watson's use of the word "masochist": the film is set in 1891 and the word was first recorded in 1890.
  • Holmes' beat-up fedora is of the period, though just barely: the play the hat came from was first performed in 1882, and reached the English-speaking world in 1889 (the novel Trilby didn't come out until 1894). Even so, it took a while for the particular style Holmes is seen wearing to catch on as a men's fashion; early men's fedoras more closely resembled a Homburg than anything else. Since everyone else is dressed much more traditionally, Holmes' wardrobe choices were probably made to showcase his eccentricity.
• Deleted Scene: So, Irene never got around to trying to stab Holmes with a hair pin or kneeing him in the... meerschaum, eh? Not to mention not wandering around in that saucy corset. No-good, dirty, lyin' trailer.
• Dyeing for Your Art: Downey did this movie in between the two Iron Man movies. Look at how beefy Tony Stark is compared to how wire-thin Holmes is. That takes dedication.
  • Rob also was meticulous in making sure his accent was perfect for the character and historical period.
    • It was perfect for modern perceptions, but it wasn't historically accurate. Historical British sounded much closer to modern Americans than modern Britons. It mainly revolves around rhotic speech.
• Fake American:
  • Canadian Rachel McAdams as New Jerseyite Irene Adler.
  • Canadian William Hope as American ambassador Standish.
• Fake Brit: American Robert Downey, Jr.. as... well... isn't it obvious? Downey's accent was almost flawless.
• Fan Nickname: Watson quickly became known as Hotson.
• Hey, It's That Guy!:
  • Tony Stark and Sky Captain team up to fight against the nefarious Archy. Regina George guest stars.
    • Dredger is played Robert Maillet, who wrestled in the WWF/E as Kurrgan for several years in the 90's.
    • Fans of The Tudors will recognise Lord Coward as Thomas Cranmner.
    • Essentially, Tony Stark and Lemony Snicket try to stop Mr. David Robert Jones with the help of Claire Cleary.
    • Also, Flora, Holmes's fake fortune teller, is Trudi.
    • And Mycroft Holmes is Gordon Gordon Wyatt
    • Moriarty is Lane Pryce.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: Stephen Fry flirted with Hugh Laurie on A Bit of Fry and Laurie. Laurie went on to play House (who was based very heavily on Holmes), and Stephen Fry went on to play Mycroft. Does that make it incest?
  • Or as certain fans say, Holmescest?
• Shout-Out:
  • Combined with Continuity Nod, the Establishing Shot of Baker Street is almost exactly the same shot that opened the Granada Sherlock Holmes series with the seminal Jeremy Brett.
  • A rather far-fetched Shout-Out is the newspaper a certain character reads at one point. The headline says "Panic in the streets." It's a London newspaper. Does Guy Ritchie like the Smiths?
  • "Dredger" bears some resemblance to Rondo Hatton, who played a similar hulking villain in the 1944 Holmes film "Pearl of Death".
  • The scene where Watson tries to interest Holmes in some seemingly bizarre cases that people have written in to him about, only for Holmes to curtly reveal he's deduced the actually-very-mundane solutions from simply reading the letters, harkens back to a similar scene in Billy Wilder's '"The Private Life Of Sherlock Holmes.
• Shout-Out: To Shakespeare:
  • A line from Henry V, Act III while leaving the cemetery: Watson: "Follow your spirit..." Holmes *joining*: "And upon this charge, cry God for Harry, England, and St. George!"
    • Of course, the most important part of this quote is the first line: "The game's afoot"...