Ritchie wanted 'Holmes' family-friendly

Guy Ritchie made ‘Sherlock Holmes’ for his children to watch.

The British director – who has sons Rocco, eight, and David, four, with ex-wife Madonna – says he deliberately made a family-friendly version of the detective movie, which stars Robert Downey Jr in the title role.

He said: "That's really the idea — for it to be a family movie. It has dark moments, but it's accessible. I'm a dad, and I want to go to my movies with kids as well."

Meanwhile, the ‘RocknRolla’ director says he is delighted with the way Downey Jr and Jude Law – who plays sidekick Watson – have played up the lesser-explored side of their characters’ friendship.

He added to MTV News: "Holmes and Watson have always been that couple. My intention was to get away from the slightly stuffier, quintessential Victorian concepts of men and make them warmer and more accessibly friendly and make them more into the kinds of guys I'd liked to be friends with."

" These guys are sort of in love with each other. It's real mateship. It's trying to keep that balance. You have to endear yourself to them, and at times you skate on thin ice, because it's such a relationship about two men."