Im not particularly familiar with this Bieber character, so to rant about him would be remiss.
Especially when theres a more enjoyable pop star project in 3D screens right now.
As high concepts go, they dont get much higher.
The gnomes in 2Bs garden wear blue hats and the garden ornaments at Not 2B wear red hats.
The neighbours who live in 2B and Not 2B (geddit?)
feud with one another, and so do their garden ornaments, in a war for horticultural supremacy.
Blue-hatted Gnomeo has a chance meeting with red-hatted Juliet, and a star-crossed romance begins.
And, on the whole, it is something better than expected.
However, its not above borrowing certain tropes and story beats wholesale from other animated hits.
For instance, one scene involving the flamboyant plastic flamingo, Featherstone, is straight out ofToy Story 2.
Theres a nice sense of jeopardy established in how fragile the characters are.
As inToy Story, theyre inanimate objects that come to life, and thus are perfectly breakable.
Ill let you keep wondering.
Crucially, though, each of them managed to make me laugh at least once.
The whole thing is a camp, colourful and deeply eccentric affair.
Its more eclectic than certain other films, and as mentioned, the source material looms large.
If you assumed this is no good on first impression, you wouldnt be the first.
One of John Lasseters first acts when Disney acquired Pixar was to shut this production down.
Im not saying that this is better thanTangled, because its not.
I did enjoy it more, however.
Gnomeo & Julietwill travel well, except maybe across age demographics.
Rating:
3 out of 5
