| Yes, Shrek is animated, but- parents be forewarned- it is not really for children. In fact, other than a few requisite fart jokes, I'm surprised what kids in the audience (read: the majority of the audience) got out of it at all. Plotwise, to sum up: Shrek has been described as the inverted Beauty and the Beast provided that Beauty truly see, love, and accept Beast's inner self thereby not needing him to return to human form for her happy ending. That said, Shrek is an ogre who lives in the woods and has no friends because he has selfesteem issues about his unsightly green exterior. People never want to get to know him, they always just run away. Boo hoo. Meanwhile, Lord Farquaad (the bad guy) in pursuit of a more-perfect kingdom is having all of the fairy tale creatures who also live in and around the forest detained and sent to a resettlement area. (Think Snow White meets the Trail of Tears) That area happens to be in Shrek's swamp. Since hermits hate fairy tale creatures camping on their front lawns, Shrek goes with new friend/annoyance Donkey to take Farquaad to task in getting his swamp back. Farquaad, we find out too, wants to be king and to be king he needs to marry a princess. He decides he wants to marry Princess Fiona who at the moment is herself detained by a firebreathing dragon in the top of a faraway castle. Sooner than later after Shrek goes WWF on some soldiers to the theme song from "Freaks and Geeks" (don't ask) a deal is struck. Shrek gets his land back if he can get the princess and bring her to Farquaad. A hop, skip, and a quest later, Shrek and Donkey get the sassy princess and head home, hijinks ensue. (That's not anywhere near the end, by the way, so don't get mad. It only gets freakier from here but I won't spoil anything) Politically, Shrek is nothing more than Jeffrey Katzenberg, former Disney animation lord who oversaw Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and The Lion King among others and current partner of Dreamworks (he's the K in Dreamworks SKG), getting his last hurrah that apparently wasn't satisfied in his last multimillion dollar settlement against the Mousehouse for taking his job not so long ago. Disney is all over this film and not in any nice way. The first twenty minutes alone are an unbelieveable string of allusions to particular scenes within many Disney classics. And, as Shrek is a fractured fairy tale, many of the characters all huddled together have at one time been key to a Disney film too, here for the abusing- Jepetto selling off Pinnochio for 10 bits is just one of these instances. Katzenberg has been denying malice for months. He suggests that while he hasn't any problems wearing the barbs on his sleeves, that they are merely harmless in nature. He went so far as to send a copy to the Disney Studios in requesting to know if it was too much for anybody. Disney apparently responded that it was "nothing [they] couldn't handle." Perhaps the real kicker, though, is Lord Farquaad's castle/palace/fortress thing. Complete with cutesy parking lot signs ("You're parked in Lancelot") turnstiles, singing puppets, gift shops, and men walking in costume as Farquaad, Duloc (that's the name of the castle/palace/fortress thing) has Disneyworld down to a tee and I dare you to prove me wrong. With that in mind, let's move on... Shrek supposedly represents a new breakthrough in computer animation whereby light reflects more realistically off various objects. In the words of Shania Twain, though, "That don't impress me much." Frankly, I hadn't wanted to see Shrek at all due to the fact that I thought the characters looked so stifled and strange. Particularly the Princess Fiona character. Even in watching the movie through, she incessantly bothered me. Donkey, as well, seemed more of a donkey mixed with a miniature Schnauzer, his legs being about 3" off the ground. Animators it seems still don't have a grasp on capturing humans in general. Farquaad is expressive and indeed has quite the chest of hair (which by the way was disgusting) but only his cartoonish ways are his saving grace from being utterly awkward. Guess I'll just bide my time until the Final Fantasy movie. Last: my chief soapbox eulogy: What happened to children's movies? I work in a video store, our hottest and latest new kids releases involve the Olson twins and a monkey playing hockey (not together, that's two separate movies) Perhaps these are a little more harmless than those I make my argument against, but certainly base quality must come immediately into question. Why even have we gone from something so unforgettable as Beauty and the Beast to something so uselessly derivative as The Emperor's New Groove? Since when are children's movies not made for children anymore? Every joke a double entendre. Every nuance violent or sexual. And no longer timeless. Every quip referential. Sure the argument can be made that if kids are going to go to movies parents have to take them, so why not throw the folks a bone? I counter, why not tell a story like they used to seem to be able to and not pander to the lowest common denominator? People enjoy good movies, that never changes. What seems to have changed is what moviemakers seem to think audiences enjoy. Would Prince Charming ever suffer from flatulence? Would Timothy ever ask Dumbo, "You talkin' to me?" (suspending the idea that DeNiro was just being born when Dumbo was released, but I'm sure you get my idea) In Shrek, a dragon becomes romantically attached to Donkey (voiced by Eddie Murphy, who should have known better anyhow than to vocally play to black stereotypes and be a mule at that). Clearly the audience needed then to be clued into the fact that Donkey's sly postponing of sex with the dragon is only until he's worked out the stifling size difference between them. When seeing Farquaad's enormous Xanadu, Duloc, Shrek muses that perhaps in making Duloc so large he's making up for a small penis. Donkey is also repeatedly referred to with variations on the word "ass" and Donkey, himself, loves the word "damn." (This doesn't personally offend me but even the 5-year old behind me made several comments like, "Why does he have to keep saying that?" Parents should wonder the same thing.) I could go on and on. Shrek, conclusively, couldn't be less timeless or less for children, and perhaps it wasn't trying to be either. However, it is certainly being marketed that way. I urge animators and creators of children's entertainment to go back to the basics. Just because we don't live under the production code doesn't mean children should be growing up faster and faster these days. And I should clarify, I am not a religious person, I am not a parent, I am not conservative, and I'm certainly not wholesome, however, I do know that there can be great children's entertainment out there that even Mom and Dad can enjoy and there's nothing shameful in that. Go back to any of the Disney classics, look at The Black Stallion, A NeverEnding Story, The Borrowers. And, yes, I'm sure you could nitpick 100 counterarguments within those films, but they are for the most part, untouched by time. Will even Robin Williams's Arsenio Hall impressions under the guise of the Genie mean anything to the next generation showing their kids Aladdin? No. No they will not and it is unfortunate. Shrek, like so many other PG and G rated movies today rake in the dough, but ultimately do a disservice to their craft, their lineage and their audience. Let's hope we go back to basics soon. A small last word, in addition to that last point: Shrek is also part gross-out comedy which may make things better or worse depending on your taste. For me, it was worse. Shrek makes candles out of his own ear wax and brushes his teeth with bug intestines. Continuously the audience is made to audibly shout, "Eeech!" But, he's an ogre, right? So, go figure. By Dan $6.00/10.00 |
| Shrek By Dan |