Thursday, July 23, 2020

Closing Mr. Holmes

Mr. Holmes. A well crafted movie performed sensitively well by professional actors. Mr. Sherlock Holmes in his senior years reconstructs his final case aided by a young boy interested in developing his probing-solving skills.

Mr. Holmes as depicted by Sir Ian McKellen is not just facts and figures but heart too; suffering from forgetfulness and aloneness, the aging detective displays vulnerability.
British theater and film actor Ian is supported ably well by Laura Linney as Mrs. Munro, the housekeeper and mother and Milo Parker as Roger the son and the protégé.
Roger shares his interest in bees and wasps, Holmes' unfinished writings and unresolved cases. Roger was raised without a father with some resentment to his mother. Mr. Holmes' word to his protégé, "one should not leave this life without a sense of completion." Roger helped Sherlock solve his last case and in recalling the gap between a Japanese diplomat and his son.
Prior to his closure statement he told Roger relating to bees and humans, "death, grieving, mourning, they're all commonplace." Line resonates better in the language translated in Tagalized Movie Channel (80 on Sky Cable) as " kamatayan, nagdadalamhati, pagdadalamhati, lahat sila ay pangkaraniwan" said twice by Holmes.
Theme on the realization of death, fading memories, bees and wasps, conflict between mother and son, master and protege, unresolved business dramatised well in the movie at the time of the pandemic deepens our appreciation for our personal journey.
As the movie closes, Mr. Holmes recalls the people important in his life; those who have gone beyond him. But it is in solving one final case relating to the unexpected death that he understood what loneliness was. Though physically weak and emotionally vulnerable, Roger, the inquisitive protege inspired him to continue to live and to close chapters.
One of my favourites during the lockdown. In Tagalog, "may tagos!"

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