Enola Holmes - An Honest Review 5/10

Not the member of the Holmes family everybody expects to get a movie surrounding, but a nice addition to the franchise all the same! Enola Holmes as a character is charismatic, intelligent, brilliant, all things you would want from the younger sibling of Sherlock. Her adventure to find her mother is a bit of a long one though at over two hours running time, so you’ll have to stick with it.

Millie Bobby-Brown plays our articulate titular character, and I think she did a great job at that. Her facial expressions have such depth and variety that she conveys all of the emotions you can expect from a teenager who is not only on the run, but also troubled with the disappearance of her mother. Despite her mother’s exit from the household being deemed unsuspicious by both Mycroft and Sherlock, Enola wasn’t so sure, with no letter to her daughter to explain anything there’s a degree of uncertainty as to whether or not she had left of her own accord, or if something more disturbing was afoot.

With a great start to the movie, we get to learn of the type of upbringing Enola was subjected to, with her mother having taught her everything she knows. Her father passed away when she was younger, and her two older siblings had moved away many moons ago. As a young girl she idolised Eudoria, a kind, playful parent with her daughter’s best interests at heart. We see scenes of the two of them practicing self-defence, painting and playing board games that a superior level of intelligence is often attributed to. Enola is a keen reader, and as such has a great knowledge of a vast amount of topics. She is inquisitive and driven; but also stubborn. Her adventure begins when she devises a plan to go to London in search of mumsy, using information she had happened across in the home, overheard from conversations her mother had with strangers, and also in some cases decoded based on those very memories and strange encounters. From here the movie develops an addition to the plot – whilst searching for her mum she boards a train carrying a passenger fleeing from their family. I won’t go into details for how this goes or what it entails, but it amounts in two mysteries she has to solve. In typical Sherlock fashion he begins his detective work, eventually also becoming involved in the case of the missing viscount.

I’m a fan of a good detective story, but I found that despite being given lots of clues and answers, the movie itself was a little bit boring in the middle. It definitely could have done with twenty minutes less story. Once the viscount becomes part of it all I actually just wanted the movie to be about him. I found the mother leaving to be a mute plot point, with Enola having so much fun being a detective and trying to assist the viscount that come the end of the film I had forgotten about the main plot point! The two youngsters seemed to be love-struck and yet their relationship did not blossom in that way, which I would have loved. Young love needs more representation in movies!

I thought the sets and costumes looked fantastic! Of course the ladies always looked good with their corsets and dresses etc, but the guys also looked dapper. I wish there was more of Sherlock in this movie, but do appreciate that his presence would hamper Enola’s story arc. I think a Sherlock movie with Henry Cavill would definitely work. But then anything he’s in usually gets a thumbs up from me!

All in all, an entertaining watch which I think would be enjoyed by families and individuals alike. I think that there are some great action sequences, some great verbal exchanges between the Holmes siblings and the movie itself looked great. But the slow story line is why I’ve gone with the rating I have.

A review by CB