That was a terrible pun. It was supposed to conflate Enola’s abandonment with the Home Alone franchise… Let’s move on.
I just watched the Enola Homes movie on Netflix, and I have some notes.
Overall, this was a good movie. It’s a cute coming of age story about an intelligent girl in Victorian England searching for her missing mother. Enola’s story has her dealing with a lot of period-appropriate sexism but is a light-hearted way. There is no doubt that Enola has what it takes to achieve her goals. It’s just a matter of how.
If you have seen the trailer, then you know the tone of the movie. So if you’re like me and loved the trailer, you are going to have a great time.
But it wasn’t all good.
This movie is a little inconsistent. Does Enola know how to wear a corset or not? The first time she is faced with one, she acts as if she never has and does not wish to start. Later, Enola can wear one without any help and even fights in it with ease. (As a modern corset wearer, I can tell you that corsets push against the diaphragm making the wearer take shallower breathes through their chest.) But later, she shows discomfort when wearing one. (A corset isn’t supposed to give the wearer pain. If it does, it is too tight and needs to be loosened.)
While that might seem like a minor issue, it reflects other, more subtle inconsistencies in Enola’s story. Enola claims (and the movie shows) that Enola’s only teacher was her mother, but about 45 minutes in, we meet a black jujitsu instructor calling herself Enola’s first teacher. If Enola grew up in isolation, how can she function in daily life with no problems? Mycroft wanted her to go to a finishing school to learn how to be a proper lady, but then, why can she blend into a crowd disguised as just that? Which is it movie?
Speaking of Enola’s teacher, I remembered another problem I had, the handling of social issues other than women’s rights. As far as I can tell, racism doesn’t exist in the world of Enola Holmes. Nothing stops a Black woman from owning a tea shop and running a dojo or an Arabic man from becoming an Inspector for Scotland Yard. I wouldn’t have minded if not for the political theme of women’s rights that the movie revolves around. So it seems a little single-minded in its political commentary.
When it came to characters, I hated this movie’s version of Mycroft Holmes. He seems stupid compared to every other version of the Mycroft that I have seen. For those of you who don’t know, in Doyle’s original stories, Mycroft was described as being more intelligent than Sherlock and having better deductive reasoning skills than him. The only reason he isn’t a famous detective is that he is lazy. It prevents him from doing the fieldwork required for the job. However, the Mycroft in this movie is just some simple-minded jerk who only cares about his social standing. It’s almost like this story was written with an original brother for Sherlock Holmes, only to discover that he already one.
The overall theme of Enola’s story is defining yourself in a world that wants to control you. Enola doesn’t allow any man to make decisions for her, but her mother gets to manipulate Enola into following in her footsteps all movie. In the end, Enola finally gets the opportunity to choose her independence over her mother’s path for her.
And how does the story about defining herself end? With Enola trying to be a detective just like her brother Sherlock. Though this isn’t a surprise. The movie is about solving a mystery, and it makes it clear how much she idolizes her famous brother. But, following in his footsteps feels like it goes against the story’s message. I did like this path for Enola, but it robs Enola of her self-actualization.
I feel like my last two complaints could be fixed with a simple rewrite.
Instead of writing Enola as Sherlock’s sister, keep Sherlock a fictional character in her story. Add The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes to the collection in Holmes’ library. Enola could then idolize a character who shared her name without compromising her self-growth. This change also means her jerk brother could just be some guy and not a poor adaptation of Mycroft.
Enola Holmes is by no means a perfect movie, but it is a good movie. I had a good time watching it, and that all I could really ask for.
I Think Thinks 