The game is afoot: family fun throughout 'Sherlock Gnomes'

Spud Nut,

Sherlock Gnomes (PG, 97 minutes) is an animated sequel to the 2011 movie about ceramic garden ornamental statues that come to life when humans are not around.

Gnomeo, Juliet, and their friends get moved to a new home in London, and have to start making improvements in their new garden.

Soon afterwards, someone steals all the other gnomes at their place, and also steals them all over town.

They contact the foremost detective of their kind and have him search for the missing gnomes.

Sherlock Gnomes and Watson suspect that Moriarty is the culprit and the game is on.

The interesting thing about this film is that Elton John was the executive producer and wrote some original songs for the soundtrack.

The gnome characters are cute and amusing, although the script is not full of hard laughs like contained in many children’s pictures these days.

Kids will get at least two potatoes worth of wholesome family entertainment when seeing this release. Other comedies may be better, but this one is worth the price of admission.

Tater Tot