I was glad science won out over trickery. I think that’s a good take home message for the film and I hope people “got” it.

I have to say, I was very worried throughout the entire movie that they had thrust Holmes into a world of magic, and up until the very end I was concerned that this movie was going to ruin the image of Holmes for a younger generation that has never read one of his stories. Of course, once everything snapped into place, I was pleased as pie that the writers stayed true enough to the original character.

Also, a side note: I’m a fan of both Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels, and Snatch, and I didn’t know that Guy Ritchie directed the film. During the boxing scene between Holmes and the big guy, I kept thinking to myself, “Where have I seen this kind of work before?”

Can’t wait for the sequel.

Actually, the quote is from “A Scandal in Bohemia”.

I was reading it today, because it’s the story that introduces Irene Adler.

Anyway, awesome movie. Can’t wait for Moriarti.

@qyiet – a twin? had you just watched the Prestige?

My only lingering question: in the 1st scene, all the shaking and such of the sacrifice can be explained by some sort of toxin, but why was she about to stab herself? The end the pain?

I got all the magic effects before they were revealed with one exception.
[MAJOR SPOILERS]
While I didn’t get that it was a poisen made from a flower. I did figure it was a poisen that was in his bath salts.

Similarly I picked that the man who was set on fire by a ‘protective spell’ was coated in a flammable substance ignighted by his gunshot. I didn’t pick the application method.

The only thing I missed completely was the hanging->dead man test. I figured that it was a twin that had actually died. However that would have been revealed by his father.
[/MAJOR SPOILERS]

Anyways.. good movie, go see it. I didn’t feel that it was in any way impossible for the audience to keep up. That is however giving the audience much more credit for not being retards than most US movie studios do.

The quote is from [i]A Study in Scarlet[/i].

“It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.”
– Sherlock Holmes

Jay Novella used it once as a closing quote on The Skeptic’s Guide, which is how I remembered it when I saw the Sherlock Holmes film.

There was one quote in particular that made my husband and I cheer silently…when he was kind of scolding Watson for saying they should consider the paranormal explanation. He gave a great little quote on why you shouldn’t start with a conclusion and bend the facts to fit that story, but why you should follow the evidence to wherever it leads. I wish I could remember the exact wording.

I also shared the concern about the accessibility of the various clues to the viewer, but as I think about it I realize that from a skeptic’s standpoint the way it was done was one of the best ways to do the movie. It’s often said that magicians become interested in skepticism through their intimate understanding of how people are fooled: in my opinion this movie functions like one of Penn & Teller’s magic acts in which they first show the trick and then reveal how it is done.

The movie lets you believe that “magic” is actually happening, if you want to, by hiding the magician Blackwood’s preparations to achieve his desired effects. Then in the end it shows you that it was really your own incomplete knowledge as well as what people say that (may have) led you to believe something supernatural was occurring. Although I don’t see most people thinking about this movie that much, I do think it is a great non-explicit primer on the principles of skepticism and scientific investigation and that someone somewhere will think a little differently because of it.