Holmes goes action hero in Ritchie's energized political thriller

How much you will appreciate Guy Ritchie's reinterpretation of famous London detective Sherlock Holmes depends entirely on how willing you are to accept Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's eccentric sleuth as a genetic cross between Indiana Jones, Jackie Chan and Tyler Durden from "Fight Club."

Gone are the familiar deerstalker cap and ornate, deep-bowl pipe traditionally linked to the great detective, especially as portrayed by the immortal Basil Rathbone during a series of classic black-and-white movies from the late 1930s and '40s.

Robert Downey Jr.'s "Sherlock Holmes" is a buffed and manly Holmes, an able and willing participant in both fisticuffs and sexual hanky-panky, while co-star Jude Law reinvents Nigel Bruce's lovably bumbling Dr. Watson as a handsome gentleman physician who's as handy with a Derringer as he is with a stethoscope.

This being a movie by Guy Ritchie - the British director who gave us the crime thrillers "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels" and "Snatch" plus the abysmal Madonna vehicle "Swept Away" - this engaging work of pop cinema thrives more on attitude and action than on plot and character.

In fact, I'm not even sure I understood half of what was going on between the chases, punches and double entendres, but I took solace in the knowledge that all the "clues" to the mystery openly paraded before us would be explained and neatly tied up by Holmes before the closing credits.

The story begins with Holmes and Watson interrupting a bizarre religious ceremony in which a young woman is about to be sacrificed on an altar.

Their intervention precipitates the arrest of the instantly evil Lord Blackwood (Mark Strong), a dabbler in black magic and a mystic leader of some sort of weird, ill-defined hoodie cult right out of Stanley Kubrick's "Eyes Wide Shut."

Lord Blackwood likes to utter mystical musings such as "Death is only the beginning!"

He's sentenced to be hanged for the murders of several women. Dr. Watson, in fact, examines Lord Blackwood's hanged corpse and pronounces him dead.

To their surprise (but not so much to ours), Lord Blackwood's crypt breaks open soon after his burial and a cemetery worker claims to have seen the dead man rise from the grave.

Could it be?

Of course. Word of Lord Blackwood's resurrection becomes such a powerful calling card that the power-mad cad easily creates a Mason-like secret society of movers and shakers dedicated to taking over Great Britain and re-establishing control over its rebellious child, the United States of America.

Meanwhile, "Sherlock Holmes" attempts to delve into the thin relationships of its main characters. Holmes' empty personal life perks up with the arrival of a woman from his past, Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams), a con artist who apparently had an affair with the detective, although the specifics never are revealed, and the action-oriented screenplay doesn't seem all that interested in the relationship anyway.

Meanwhile, a humorous subplot has Dr. Watson attempting to meet the parents of his new girlfriend Mary (Kelly Reilly), but the jealous Holmes quietly undermines every attempt Watson makes to move away from his friend.

With Hans Zimmer supplying a soaring action score, Ritchie cranks up the editing, throws a barrage of visuals at us (many of them gritty, atmospheric shots of a dirty, dingy London), and gives Holmes an unstoppable James Bondian henchman to dodge.

This is not your granddaddy's "Sherlock Holmes."

It's almost not Sir Arthur's Sherlock Holmes at all.

"Sherlock Holmes"

Rating: ★ ★ ★

Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Jude Law, Rachel McAdams, Mark Strong

Directed by: Guy Ritchie

Other: A Warner Bros. release. Rated PG-13 for suggested nudity, violence. 128 minutes