![]() ![]() Yuen and Chow keep the narrative momentum moving forward at all times, minimizing the story lag there are plenty of throwaway character moments (Sherlock trying to get a table at his favorite sweet shop after he puts Mack away is brief, but effective), emotion and messaging, but never causing either story lag or bloat.Īll that is broken up by a few solid set pieces - a bicycle chase, Sherlock’s moody walk through London’s Victorian ghetto, skiing to the train station - as well as a handful of great retro-styled interstitials that detail the crime scenes. The colors are vivid and that animation has simple mechanics that don’t strain the eye and allow the action to be seen clearly. Yuen is best known for his sneakily pithy social commentary in the My Life as McDull animated series, and along with Chow their 2D-mimicking 3D art shares many of the traits of that film. When thug inmate Scarface (a bear) busts out of Barnard Castle Prison and threatens Katie, Sherlock and Mack (who’s also escaped) team up with Riller, Fox and Watson to get them both back where they belong. In a demonstration of forgiveness and redemption, the two rivals become friends during Mack’s four-year prison sentence. Watson is a cat.īut as in the folklore, White Storm is a hero to the downtrodden, and when Sherlock and Riller finally apprehend him, humiliatingly, in front of his orphaned daughter Katie, Sherlock becomes a social pariah. The Scotland Yard investigators Holmes irritates are Gordon Riller - a gorilla - and Carlson Fox. The great detective of the title is, of course, famed fictional sleuth Sherlock Holmes (Ken Wong), who determines quickly that the latest crime perpetrated by White Storm was, in fact, not White Storm. The adventure begins with master thief White Storm, also known simply as Mack (voiced in the original Cantonese by Stephen Au), breaking into the home of a wealthy industrialist.Īs it happens, White Storm is something of a Robin Hood, and donates most of his loot to local Londoners living in poverty on the city’s fringes as it marches forward into the 20th century. Unfolding In turn-of-the-last-century London, The Great Detective trades on that most dependable of children’s animations: a heroic literary figure - real or fictional - as a shamefully swanky, anthropomorphized animal (thinking Disney’s Robin Hood here), in this case a stylish gray hound. And since it is animated, language conversions for foreign distributors will be relatively simple, and that could pique the interest of adventurous buyers willing to trade on the familiar Sherlock Holmes brand. It should also perform well in China, where the books are equally popular, and naturally at kids’ events overseas. Audiences looking for family-friendly fare that’s just a little different from the big ticket Pixar and Disney tentpoles will be tempted by the modest but entirely engaging The Great Detective, particularly at home in Hong Kong.
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