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War makes some buddies. Art provides the rest. Who can forget Huck helping Jim escape from slavery in Mark Twain’s “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” or Huck’s misadventures with Tom Sawyer?

Opera more your thing? Consider then Verdi’s “Don Carlo,” in which the rebellious Spanish prince of the title and the Marquis of Posa pledge their undying loyalty, which Posa makes good on by sacrificing himself to save Don Carlo from the Inquisition.

In Bizet’s “Les Pêcheurs de perles” (“The Pearl Fishers”), pals Zurga and Nadir warble a similar pledge in one of opera’s most moving duets (“Au fond du temple saint”). But when mutual love Leila rekindles a forbidden romance with Nadir, noble Zurga dies helping them to escape.

These may be the ultimate buddy stories, in which the words of Jesus ring true: “Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friend.”

The buddy system

By Georgette Gouveia

In an enchanting moment from “Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows,” Robert Downey Jr.’s Holmes waltzes Jude Law’s Dr. Watson around the ballroom of a Swiss castle right out of “Frankenstein,” the better to deduce the activities of Holmesian nemesis Professor Moriarty.

“Who taught you to dance like this?” Holmes asks Watson archly.

Watson smiles before responding: “You did.”

That moment crystallizes what fans of the new series have long suspected: No matter how dastardly the villain or dire the circumstances, the new “Sherlock Holmes” is first and last a buddy movie.

The buddy narrative has, of course, a long tradition in Hollywood – and an even longer one in the fine arts and history. (See sidebar.) Think “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” (1969) and before that any number of war pictures and all those comedy teams – Laurel and Hardy; Abbott and Costello; Hope and Crosby; and Martin and Lewis. Indeed, “Videohound’s Golden Movie Retriever,” a bible of movies on DVD, lists some 670 buddy titles.

Nor is the buddy story limited to the big screen. Among the buds who also appeared on the small screen are Oscar Madison and Felix Unger in “The Odd Couple” and Capt. Kirk and Mr. Spock in “Star Trek.”

The buddy genre owes some of its inspiration to another Hollywood staple – the strong, silent hero who strides alone through the pix of John Wayne, Gary Cooper and much later, Clint Eastwood.

“Most movies are about heroes, and heroes have flaws,” says film critic Marshall Fine (hollywoodandfine.com). “As good as you think you are, you’re better when there are two of you. The two of you make up a better you.”