We just watched Enola Holmes! And it’s everything we expected and more. We can’t tell you much for now, but we promise that you will love her. This is a story about struggled, freedom, overcoming obstacles, a story about finding oneself and reconciling with the past, learning from it. In short, it’s the story of life itself. If you want to know more … here is an advanced review!
Here we go!
Enola Holmes is … fucking amazing. At the beginning of the movie, you don’t really know what to expect, they give you different plots, but you don’t quite put the pieces of the puzzle together. It entertains you, it even amuses you, but the way it approaches things is new and you don’t really know if you love it or it totally takes you out of the history you know … however, it grabs you. It’s those first moments that hook you. And then you just can’t stop looking.
The way the movie tells the story is different from what we normally see, that’s why at first it seems strange to you, but it fits so well. They perfectly intermingle the past and the present to build the common thread of the story. In addition, the word games, suspicion and intelligence that Enola shows is something that you will need to be able to build the puzzle that Enola Holmes shows us.
Absolutely every scene is full of subtle details that are pieces of something much bigger. One piece of advice, take a good look at the dialogue and every detail of every scene because everything matters. Enola speaks to us, the spectators, making us participants in this history, her history, but also our history.
Because Enola’s story is that of all of us. She’s a woman who starts looking for her mother, who has mysteriously disappeared, but ends up finding herself. She fights for her freedom, to build her path, to choose for herself what she wants to do and not obey the designs of others. She’s special, brave, intelligent, extraordinary, unique and she just wants to go out into the world and live on her own terms in the middle of a society that barely lets her breathe, and that dictates that being a woman means having to marry, have children and have no other aspirations in life.
But she is not cut out for that. She is made to fight. And that’s what she does. She fights for herself, for the things she believes in, and for the life she wants to lead. Fights to go her own way. At first, Enola’s only claim was to find her mother and escape the fate of her uptight brother Mycroft and, for that, she was trying to think and act just as her own mother would. But in the end, she ends up following her heart and acting like herself … that’s when she finds her true path. When she finds herself and her future.
In the middle of that journey, Enola has to deal with Mycroft, who considers her a nuisance and an embarrassment. He just wants to clip her wings … and he almost succeeds. At the other extreme of things is her other brother, Detective Sherlock Holmes. He loves her, although he has never shown it. And I think you’re going to hate him a bit at first (yes, even though he’s Henry Cavill) but afterward, he also grows up and learns from his own mistakes. He’s the one of the two brothers who, I feel ends up accepting and respecting Enola for who she is. Not trying to change her, just respecting who she is and feeling tremendously proud of her.
To all this we must add someone unexpected, who finds Enola and gets in the middle of her path and her destiny without her wanting him or expecting him or even liking him. But that story will be the key to Enola’s journey. Because the future cannot be planned, it has its own plan. Enola searches for one thing … but ends up finding what she really needs without knowing it.
The disappearance of Enola’s mother marks the beginning of her journey and, little by little, we’re discovering the secrets of this character and the reason why she disappeared. That reason … will surprise you and I think it will make you have mixed feelings. I feel them. On the one hand, I admired her, I understood her, on the other, I just … hated what she did, even if the reason is admirable. However, I think that when you see Enola Holmes, you will agree with me that she is a brave woman and a good mother who taught her daughter everything she really needed to know, everything that mattered.
All the actors stand out in this movie (Henry Cavill, I’m looking at you, it’s impossible not to notice this man, how handsome he is, how he acts, how he moves) but Millie Bobby Brown shines. She shines with her own light. She was born to be Enola Holmes. You’re going to feel absolutely everything that the character feels. Her expression, her movements, her eyes … she expresses absolutely everything and transmits it to us perfectly. And that chemistry with each person she shares a scene with. OMG! It’s explosive!
You’re going to love everything about Enola Holmes, but I think what you are going to like the most is that you are going to be able to identify with history. At the end of the day, it’s about the struggle to find our freedom and our own path, our independence, to be who we are. The struggle to find ourselves. Remember: our future is up to us.