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Shrek the Third
Critics' Reviews
 'Shrek' Slows Down in 'Third' By John Hartl, Film critic, MSNBC Shrek, a sweet-natured ogre whose rancid greenish color suggests a poorly adjusted color-television set, has become the hero of the most successful fractured fairy tale in film history. The original "Shrek," which won the first Academy Award for best cartoon feature, set several box-office records in 2001. The 2004 sequel drew much larger audiences, eventually landing in the No. 3 spot on the all-time, top-10 list of moneymakers, right behind "Titanic" and "Star Wars." Too bad it lacked the freshness of the original. "Shrek the Third," which is competing at the box office this month with third installments of "Spider-Man" and "Pirates of the Caribbean," may have trouble maintaining that popularity. The slide in quality this time is steep. The franchise, which desperately turns to the Camelot legend for inspiration, is clearly facing an identity crisis. Even the opening, in which the DreamWorks logo is followed by storm clouds, seems ominous. Shrek (Mike Myers) doesn't want to be Shrek, at least not King Shrek, now that his froggy father-in-law (John Cleese) has croaked and left him ruling the land of Far, Far Away. Shrek would rather be his slobbery self and hand over his kingly duties to Fiona's wimpish relative, Arthur/Artie (Justin Timberlake). Merlin (Eric Idle) makes an appearance, and there are even cameo roles for Guinevere and Lancelot. But the kingdom will not easily go to Arthur, who is required to fight for the crown with wicked Prince Charming (Rupert Everett), who has radicalized the peasants, the witch from "Snow White" and several other monsters. Seldom has the potential for a coup d'etat seemed less urgent. Still, if "2" could outdraw "1," perhaps "Third" has a chance to satisfy those who have stuck with the series from the beginning. It's as eager to please as the first two films, and the central characters are often just as endearing. But the first film is looking more and more like a unique achievement. The most noticeable missing element in "Shrek 2" was the visual wit of the original. The characters seemed blander, less outrageous, less three-dimensional. And no villain could replace the first film's wonderfully ridiculous Lord Farquaad (voiced by John Lithgow), who looked like a trash-compacted Shakespeare with a 5 o'clock shadow. The plot of "2" also lacked the simplicity and perverse purpose of "Shrek," which turned everything upside down by transforming an ogre into a hero and a princess into a dumpling. "Shrek 2," which played with the drawbacks of "happily ever after," had a different, less immediately compelling agenda. It also couldn't match the wicked sendups of Disney icons (Pinocchio, Dumbo, Snow White) that dominated the original film. In their place, "2" made references to "Flashdance," "The Fabulous Baker Boys" and other unrelated movies aimed at an older crowd. And, whereas the first "Shrek" made surprisingly adroit use of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" and Neil Diamond's "I'm a Believer," the second one tried too hard with David Bowie's "Changes" and other obvious or less-than-inspired choices. "Shrek the Third," co-directed by Chris Miller and Raman Hui (replacing the original directors, Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jenson), is a cluttered, uneasy mixture of "1" and "2." While it revives Sleeping Beauty (Cheri Oteri) and others as accomplices to the heroine, Princess Fiona (Cameron Diaz), the screenplay (by Miller and several others) fails to provide them with much definition. Ian McShane appears as Capt. Hook and Cody Cameron is Pinocchio, but they're throwaway parts. And the song list is hopeless. The king's funeral is tastelessly attached to Wings' James Bond anthem, "Live and Let Die"; a dance is half-heartedly staged to a song from "A Chorus Line"; and, there's even a spot singled out for the terribly dated "I've Never Been to Me." Julie Andrews, wasted as the voice of the queen, is heard wistfully humming a few notes from "Mary Poppins." Perhaps she's remembering when she used to be offered roles worthy of her talents. Much easier to take are the classical excerpts from Saint-Saens, Mendelssohn and Elgar — all of which work rather well in the context of the new film. Does Shrek still have the appeal he did three years ago? The New York Times' editorial page recently claimed that he's "hugely popular with the preteen and preschool set," while scolding the promotional team for "Shrek the Third" for pushing high-calorie junk foods. (At the same time, the Times pointed out, Shrek has been appearing in public service ads that call attention to childhood obesity.) But a child-oriented phenomenon like "Shrek" can have a short shelf life. Just ask the creators of "My Little Pony." Or the voice of Shrek himself, Mike Myers, who isn't the household name he was when the first film appeared six years ago. ("The Cat in the Hat" didn't help.) The trick is reinventing the formula to appeal to more than one age group. Disney and Pixar are masters at it, and the animators behind "Shrek the Third" occasionally mine that vein successfully. An episode in which Shrek and Fiona try to feel comfortable in formal dress has some charm, and so does the exchange of personalities between Puss In Boots (Antonio Banderas) and Donkey (Eddie Murphy), both victims of a magic spell. Banderas and Murphy come closest to capturing the goofy spirit of the series when it wasn't yet a franchise. Whenever the new movie slows down, they're usually around to kick it back into gear. The same cannot be said for Timberlake, whose junior King Arthur is so whiny that his attempts at inspirational speechmaking never convince. The filmmakers could be trying to create a fresh character arc for Arthur. Despite some evidence that Timberlake and the writers were looking for a new approach to Arthur, it just doesn't click. Even the animators seem defeated by Arthur, who lacks visual distinction and moves quite awkwardly. Perhaps the lesson is: If you're going to do a Camelot movie, do a Camelot movie. "Shrek the Third" is stranded somewhere between supplying a faithful sequel and striking out into quite different territory. See also: Cast of Characters: "Shrek"
 AMG Review Perry Seibert From the very first appearance of the giant Scottish ogre, Shrek has been about fart and poop jokes. By infusing the overly familiar storytelling conventions of children's classics with the kind of laughs the MPAA tags as "crude humor," the producers found a financially successful way to seem both edgy and familiar to kids and parents alike. In the first film, the exhausting energy helped carry it along, but the message about beauty being on the inside got lost among the endlessly cruel short jokes made at the expense of bad guy Lord Farquaad. Shrek 2 was as a real mess, telling a story too emotionally complicated for the average child, and relying too heavily on uncreative pop-culture references for humor. However, the director of those first two films, Andrew Adamson, abdicated the director's throne to Chris Miller for this installment, a decision that seems to have given everybody involved a chance to rethink the direction they wanted to take with the most successful DreamWorks franchise. The confident rhythm of Shrek the Third is apparent from the opening sequences, a series of gags showing that Shrek has a tough time filling in for his father-in-law, the king of Far Far Away, who's become too sick to handle official duties like knighting ceremonies. This humorous sequence works well to set up the story, largely because the pacing allows viewers to take in the detailed animation. Instead of hammering the viewer with the umpteenth variation of Smash Mouth's "All Star," or packing in more jokes per second than we can possibly keep up with, the gags in Shrek the Third actually help move the story along -- and they get maximum laughter. One bit, for instance, finds the court trying to make the ogre appear more regal, resulting in a scene where he's made up like a lime-green Louis the XIV. This scene ends up being hilarious in the premise and in the sight gag as the outfit is full of funny details that provoke more giggles that you'd get with the mere idea of having Shrek in such a getup. Another standout scene finds Prince Charming down on his luck and reduced to acting out his heroics for an unappreciative dinner-theater audience. The humor in this sequence comes not just from how ridiculous it is for the vain prince to have hit such a low, but also because the filmmakers get in more than a few digs about cheap theater. In addition, this sequence pays off in the finale when Charming gets the chance to set right all that went wrong for him in Shrek 2. Miller and the rest of the crew maintain that level of quality throughout almost all of Shrek the Third. All the scenes get maximum impact because they are true to the characters, they always advance the story, and they find something funny to satirize, whether it's pop culture or fairy tales. The Shrek movies have always aimed to offer a new spin on the tried-and-true conventions of fairy tales, but poop and fart jokes are rarely subversive. Making an ugly, gaseous, and green ogre a heroic figure is certainly unique, but Shrek loses most of that uniqueness when it turns out he's just as brave and noble as any good-looking hero from any straight-laced fantasy -- he just looks funny. Fortunately, this time out, the filmmakers offer some very strong genre commentary thanks to the female characters. The famous fairy-tale princesses like Snow White, Cinderella, and Sleeping Beauty team up with Princess Fiona when Far Far Away comes under attack, and instead of sitting around waiting to be rescued, they stand up for their homeland and kick all kinds of butt. This concept pays off in the single funniest scene of the movie when Snow White summons all the animals of nature with her familiar sing-song, and then has them storm the castle when her lilting soprano voice slides from an ethereal melody into the opening cry of Led Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song." Once again the movie works on multiple levels, getting the viewer to laugh at the pop-culture smarts, and the twisting of fairy-tale clichés, as well as advancing the story (because really, what's a fairy tale without a good castle storming). What's genius about the moment is that the joke isn't in hearing the Zeppelin tune, it's in how massively it contrasts with the sweet innocence of Snow White, an innocence that this film transforms into a girl-empowerment lesson that offers a needed corrective to the insidious Disney Princesses marketing campaign of the last few years. Shrek the Third finally fulfills the artistic potential of the first two movies, offering a solidly constructed story with a good moral, some welcome genre commentary, and a bunch of quality laughs, all presented in a style that exudes confidence and craftsmanship. Instead of treating the movie like the cash cow it is, DreamWorks cared enough to make a movie that actually seems worthy of the gargantuan box-office numbers they expected. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide | ||||||||||||||
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