Robert Downey Jr is harpooning some pretty sweet roles, and it looks like Sherlock Holmes has just been added to the list. We get the following scoop from the murky caves of Yahoo:
Robert Downey Jr., riding high at the box office with “Iron Man,” is in final negotiations to play Sherlock Holmes in director Guy Ritchie’s movie about the super sleuth.
Ritchie’s version takes its cue from a forthcoming comic book that producer Lionel Wigram wrote as a selling tool for a new take on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s classic character. The concept sees Holmes as more adventurous and less stuffy than previous screen incarnations and mines more obscure character traits. “Sherlock Holmes” will start shooting in the fall; Warner Bros. is eyeing an October 2009 release.
I like my Sherlock Holmes stuffy. It’ s his particular nature that lends itself so well to his unmatched skills of deduction. Removing this idiosyncrasy makes the character far less interesting to me. Downey has the skills to pull off a classic Holmes and I think it’s a shame that they feel the need to make the character more relatable or hip.
This film goes head to head with the Will Ferrell and Sacha Baron Cohen Sherlock Holmes picture. It will be interesting to see both takes on the Sherlock Holmes character, he has stood the test of time for a reason, and I could watch a film featuring him (in one form or another) annually.
