A little gnome comes out at the start of this film and tells us straight out that we've seen this story before. This sets the tone for the entire film. This animated musical rendition of Shakespeare's most well known tale has fun with the plot of the romance and it also has fun with garden-themed gags.
Neighboring garden gnomes have been at war. Gnomeo (James McIvoy, X-MEN: FIRST CLASS) is the heir of the Blues. He is in a one-upmanship battle with Tybalt (Jason Statham, SNATCH), who is the heir to the Reds. One night on a secret mission to infiltrate the Reds' lawn, Gnomeo meets Juliet (Emily Blunt, THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA), the daughter of the Red leader Lord Redbrick (Michael Caine, THE DARK KNIGHT), who is own her own secret mission to snatch a rare orchid from a neutral garden. Well it's love at first sight.
Sir Elton John took this film on as a pet project, first at Disney and then independently through his Rocket Pictures. His music is infused throughout with and without lyrics. Gnomes don't break out in song, but there are musical montages.
Much of the humor is based around the garden. Gnomes, such as a sunburned sunbather who always has his towel attached, a fishing gnome that always seems to catch the same fish and Benny (Matt Lucas, ALICE IN WONDERLAND), Gnomeo's sidekick with the tall hat, provide ample sight gags. Juliet doesn't get a maid for advice, but a talkative water-squirting frog named Nanette (Ashley Jenson, TV's UGLY BETTY). A supped up lawnmower plays a destructive role. And what's up with using discarded household items as garden decorations? Does a commode really make a better flower pot?
Like in TOY STORY, the gnomes freeze around humans. The human owners of the gardens have been at odds wrongfully thinking the other is sabotaging the other's green thumb projects. The Reds have an inferred security system in place to protect their tower, which at a push of a button puts on a backyard light show.
This version of the bard's tragic romance takes a cute and sometimes campy approach to the material. It wrings every joke it can from its premise that at first just seems like a film based on a word play on the title. The romance is nothing special (like the film warns us, we've seen this done before), but it takes enough turns from the play to make us wonder where they might end up. I mean do you really expect a family animated film to end with Juliet stabbing a blade into her ceramic skin?
Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
Creator of Rick's Flicks Picks
