Roadside Attractions has released the first Mr. Holmes clip from director Bill Condon’s upcoming drama, unveiling the debut footage from the film. Ian McKellen stars as a 93-year-old iteration of Arthur Conan Doyle’s legendary detective Sherlock Holmes, and the story takes place in 1947 where the sleuth is living in retirement with his housekeeper and her amateur-detective son. Holmes finds himself haunted by a cold case from fifty years ago, and sets out to solve it once and for all without his dear Watson at his side.

This first clip sees Holmes describing the aforementioned cold case to the young boy, and McKellen unsurprisingly looks to be giving a terrific performance. While Condon has stretched his directorial talents with films like Dreamgirls and The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn as of late, this movie looks to be very much in line with his extraordinary 1998 pic Gods and Monsters, which also starred McKellen.

Watch the first Mr. Holmes clip below, via Roadside Attractions. The film also stars Laura Linney and Milo Parker. 

The picture will have its world premiere at the Berlin Film Festival, which gets underway tomorrow, and will open in theaters sometime later this year.

Here's the official synopsis for Mr. Holmes:

MR. HOLMES is a new twist on the world’s most famous detective.1947, an aging Sherlock Holmes returns from a journey to Japan, where, in search of a rare plant with powerful restorative qualities, he has witnessed the devastation of nuclear warfare.  Now, in his remote seaside farmhouse, Holmes faces the end of his days tending to his bees, with only the company of his housekeeper and her young son, Roger.  Grappling with the diminishing powers of his mind, Holmes comes to rely upon the boy as he revisits the circumstances of the unsolved case that forced him into retirement, and searches for answers to the mysteries of life and love – before it's too late.