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Dr. John Watson: Holmes, does your depravity know no bounds?

Sherlock Holmes: No.

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The film is set in 1891. After Holmes escapes from Parliament, Thomas Thornycroft's statue of Boadicea on the Thames Embankment next to Westminster Bridge can be seen, even though it was not completed until 1905. See more...

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In the scene with the French Giant all of the French lines they speak were originally in English. Director Guy Ritchie found out that the man actually spoke French as his first language and decided on the spot to change it to add to the mystery of the film. See more...

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Sherlock Holmes (2009) - 24 corrections

Directed by Guy Ritchie, starring Eddie Marsan, Jude Law, Mark Strong, Rachel McAdams, Robert Downey Jr. (add more)

Genres: Action, Adventure, Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller

Comments made in brackets are corrections from other visitors. To submit your own corrections for mistakes, just click "edit" under an entry, then choose "correct entry". You can also submit corrections for corrections, if you think a mistake has been unfairly removed.

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Holmes' ''stun baton'' works multiple times without having to recharge. That is not how electricity works. If it has the ability to discharge, it will keep going until the charges between the device and the ground are equal, which would be after one time. And batteries that small didn't exist then. [You suppose a lot knowing absolutely nothing about how this home made device of his works. A tazer can discharge multiple times without needing to recharge because it must be activated with a button press. Apparently there is a similar such activation mechanic on Holmes' baton.]
Edit Corrected by Phixius
Earlier in his career, Jude Law had a role in a TV episode of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. [How is this trivia? It's in his resume. A character having a minor part in a TV series almost 20 years before having a major role in a similarly titled/plotted movie is not really trivia, or very interesting.]
Edit Corrected by rswarrior
Sherlock Holmes says that the toxin can be made only with some herbals found in the Black Sea Region of Turkey. Turkey was founded in 1923. The movie time line must be before 1894, because the Tower Bridge was opened in that year. Turkey at that time was called Anatolia, and was part of the Ottoman Empire. [The present-day country of Turkey was only created in 1923, true. However, the name predates the modern country by many centuries; Turk, as a term for a specific ethnic group of people, goes back well over a millenium, with the Ottoman Empire being referred to informally throughout its existence as the Turkish Empire or, simply, Turkey. See, for example, this map, dated 1817, which clearly uses the term "Turkey" to refer to the area.]
Edit Corrected by Tailkinker Time
At the end underneath parliament Irene Adler takes two bullets out of a gun to use the gun powder, however, she spent all the bullets shooting at Dredger. [She spent all the bullets in her gun. However, she picks up the gun previously kicked out of Holmes' hand and uses the bullets out of that gun to dismantle Blackwood's weapon.]
Edit Corrected by bookworm1973
Sherlock Holmes says one of the reasons he knows where he is at is the letters with St. Thomas' name on it. However, he had a hood over his head so how would he have seen them? [He's sitting at Sir Thomas' desk where he can see them as he speaks. And, yes, they're upside down to him, but reading upside down is not an uncommon art, my brother can easily read and write upside down.]
Edit Corrected by bookworm1973
Since when do you have to travel from 221B Baker Street to Pentonville Prison across the Thames? [If you're referring to the scene when Holmes and Watson are on their way to see Blackwood before his execution, remember they aren't coming from Baker Street, but rather The Punch Bowl.]
Edit
It is 3 miles from the Houses of Parliament to Tower Bridge, so not the quick jog along a sewer pipe that the film would have you believe for the climax of the movie. [Compressing events, such as a three-mile run, for the sake of the film's pace/running time is a common and understandable movie convention.]
Edit
When Holmes and Watson enter the lab of the chemist that helped Lord Blackwood with all of his illusions, Holmes reasons that the room "smells of sodium phosphate, among other aromas". Aroma comes from the chemistry term aromatic, however sodium phosphate is not an aromatic compound. [No. "Aromatic" is never abbreviated to "aroma". The two words are unrelated in definition. Holmes is referring to the smells he can identify, not the properties of the sources of the smells.]
Edit Corrected by Phixius
In the scene where Dr Watson and his girfriend are having dinner with Sherlock Holmes, Dr Watson is wearing a zipped up jacket. The zipper was not invented until 1891. And this was only in the USA it wouldn't have reached British shores for years after this. [The jacket Watson is wearing in this scene is a military frock coat. These coats were common from about 1860 to just prior to WW1, and they fastened down the front with hooks and eyes, yielding the same appearance of a zipper front jacket. If you look closely you can see the hooks at his throat, and where the front pulls together slightly at the hooks and relaxes in between.]
Edit
Holmes and Dr. Watson are being ferried across the Thames the first time. Watch "Watson" change his jacket. The shot is obviously computer animated. [I just watched this scene and nothing seems out of the ordinary about Watson's movements as he puts on his jacket.]
Edit Corrected by Shannon Jackson
After Holmes and Watson get to the factory on the river and see that Adler is chained to a meat hook headed for the bandsaw, the voice of Blackwell tells them that she followed them there. How was it possible for her to have followed them when they got there by a slow boat and then how could she have managed to have already gotten captured and chained up when they had just gotten there? [Simple. She followed them and as they were looking around the room with the chemicals, Blackwood (or an associate of his) captured her and hung her up. It wouldn't have taken them long to tie her up and hang her on the hook.]
Edit Corrected by Shannon Jackson
In the scene at the end where Irene is on the bridge, she is carrying the part she removed from the contraption. In some shots, she holds one cylinder, in other shots the part is made up of two cylinders. [The part is made up of two cylinders in every single shot. Some shots however flash fast and stop motion is needed to see that the cylinders are still two.]
Edit Corrected by Ivan-sama
When Holmes, Watson and Mary are having dinner, she throws red wine in Holmes' face and it runs down all over him. He is wearing a white collar, yet when the camer pans back to him, there isn't a spot on him nor the fresh white collar. [There is wine all over his face and his hand prevents us from seeing that there is on his collar too.]
Edit Corrected by Ivan-sama
After Holmes and Watson found the ginger midgets, we see them walking in an alleyway and talking about the wristwatch. In front of them happens to be gypsy that talked to Watson a few minutes later. She stays in front of the crowd and makes a left and Sherlock and Watson go right. How can the gypsy meet Sherlock and Watson if she went away from them? [It's obvious in the following scene that Holmes arranged for the gyspy woman to accost Watson and deliver her "vision" of his future. Watson, himself, realises this, asking Holmes "Have you no shame?". What we see is the gypsy woman leaving after Holmes made his arrangements in order to be in position to meet Holmes and Watson later.]
Edit
In a shot that flashes by very briefly, a London newspaper's headline is shown: "Sherlock Holmes Aides Police." "Aides" should be "aids". ["Aide" is the old way of spelling "aid", and was therefore put on the newspaper by the filmmakers on purpose. (The modern form "aid" is a corruption from the older form "aide", which in turn is a direct export from the French word "aide", meaning assistant/assistance.).]
Edit
In scene of Piccadilly Circus, the statue of Eros is facing the wrong way. This statue was removed for protection during WWII and when returned was put the wrong way around therefore, in this scene the original position should be shown, with Eros' bow landing in Shaftsbury Avenue. [Unfortunately, you've fallen for an urban myth that the statue originally pointed towards Shaftesbury Avenue, both to acknowledge the philanthropy of Lord Shaftesbury, to whom the monument is dedicated, and as a visual pun, that Anteros (that the statue depicts Eros is, alas, another myth) firing an arrow would "bury the shaft" in Shaftesbury Avenue. While this is a rather wonderful story, sadly, it's not true; early photographs, taken three years after the monument was erected, show the arrow pointing in the opposite direction, down Lower Regent's Street, appropriately towards Parliament, as Lord Shaftesbury was a prominent political figure.]
Edit Corrected by Tailkinker Time
In the opening scene, a horse-drawn carriage races through the streets of London. The only problem is, the carriage is driving on the right side of the road with others passing on the left. In England, carriages would be on the right side. [Now that's not true. In the opening shot as well as some other shots the street is too narrow and it's a one way street. Moreover no carriages are seen passing on it's left. In addition throughout the whole movie every one's driving on the left side of the road. Why would they make such a silly mistake in this scene?]
Edit Corrected by Ivan-sama
In the scene where the large French thug reappears, he says "Tu m'as manqué?" and the subtitles read "Did you miss me?" This is a very common anglophone mistake - a native French speaker would actually say "Je t'ai manqué?", which would translate literally to "Did I miss you?" but has the idiomatic meaning of "Did you miss me?" [This is not totally true. This was a pun—only in English, though: "Did you miss me" meant both "have you longed for me" and "did you not hit me". For the reasons you have exposed, this could not be said as is in French, since both meanings couldn't be conveyed in a single sentence. Thus, the writers, having no other choice, kept the more literal one (not being hit—tu m'as manqué, which isn't a mistake when used to mean that) and omitted the second part of the pun (longing–je t'ai manqué, which *would* be a mistake). Because, let's face it, the line wasn't originally written in French...]
Edit Corrected by Sereenie
In the scene later in the movie where Irene opens the door to her room, you will see Sherlock kneeling, and was trying to "pick the lock." Well, when he stands up, and in every part of those Shots with him in that room, You will see no lock tools. [When she opens the door we see him quickly palm whatever he was using. He demonstrates later he does not need tools to pick a lock (he picks a handcuff lock with a hairpin), so he likely had a similarly innocuous tool that he simply put into his pocket.]
Edit Corrected by Jason Hoffman
After the explosion in the factory, Holmes, Watson, and Irene Adler are all shown with scars from the blast. Watson's injuries are on his left side, despite the fact that it was his right side that was facing the explosion. Since he was injured by flying shrapnel, it should be his right arm and shoulder that is injured, not his left. Likewise, Adler's scars are on her right side, when her left side was facing the explosion. [There were multiple explosions during this scene and both Adler and Holmes are shown to move up and down the corridor with both side facing the blast. She could have received her injuries whilst she was facing with her right side to the blast and received none while facing with to the left. As for Watson, he was only seen for a moment after the blast and we have no idea what happened afterwards. He could have been tossed around by the blast and landed onto something that injured his shoulder or some other explanation. Since the viewer cannot see what is happening to him, you can't call it a mistake.]
Edit Corrected by Shannon Jackson

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