16. Shrek
Revisiting this film and trying to review it almost feels like a strange thing to do when you stop and think about it. The sensation this film pioneered and what it managed to do for the film industry as a whole, let alone Dreamworks, makes it nearly impossible to feel as though any critique leveled at it has any real meaning. Despite that, there is a lot of merit to looking back at an old film and analyzing not only why it was successful but what it meant for Dreamworks then and comparing it to where the company is now.
Shrek is a film that was created almost entirely out of spite for the Disney Corporation and despite that it’s filled to the brim with a shocking amount of heart. The spite former Disney chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg had for the company lives on in a film that revels in stark contrast to the kind of films Disney were traditionally making at the time.
Going back to this film it really did surprise me just how much about what it molded into pop culture still holds up within the context of the film itself. The story of this ogre, voiced iconically by Mike Myers, who lives in a world populated by fairy tale creatures who just wants to live alone in his unabashedly gross and disgusting swamp remains insanely charming to this day.
The characters are still great. In fact, I think I may have underestimated how good they were, namely Princess Fiona, played by Cameron Diaz. She’s an excellent character and one that’s extremely easy to endear yourself to. Watching her unknowingly eat a fried rat with an ogre and claim it’s delicious and then not bat an eye when she’s informed as to what it is just kind of puts a smile on your face.
She starts out feeling like she’s trapped herself in this idea that she needs to adhere to the usual Disney script surrounding how these princess rescue situations usually go but it’s not played off as her being annoying. She’s just caught up in her own fanciful imagination. It doesn’t take long at all for her to warm up to Shrek and Donkey and because of her personality it’s easy to believe. The personality she does have was at odds with who she was pretending to be and Shrek was the person she needed to meet in order to bring that out of her.
Speaking of Donkey, that’s another character who surprised me. When the film started I was worried he was going to annoy me now that I was older but I started to realize that what makes Donkey, brought to life by Eddie Murphy, actually really endearing is the fact that he’s someone who genuinely lacks proper social skills. Every word out of his mouth is either him inquisitively asking about the hows and whats of the world or him galavanting about how the importance of connections and friendship makes everyone a better person. He comes off as a child rather than Eddie Murphy just chewing the scenery to say whatever random funny thing he can think of.
Shrek himself needs no introduction. He is an internet meme for a reason. He knows what he’s about and he wears it on his sleeve. He’s a nice guy who has banished himself from society because society has banished him from a fair chance at being loved for who he is. That idea of becoming a monster because society treats you like a monster is something that’ll be explored more in depth in Dreamworks’ Megamind but it works well enough here.
What ends up being a shame about how well this film did is, of course, all the pretenders and copycats that injected pop culture with misunderstandings as to why aspects of this film work the way they do. Most films that copied aspects of what was in Shrek simply didn’t copy them correctly. The dance ending, while it may have happened before this film, became a huge staple in children’s media partly because of this. It didn’t really matter that it was appropriate for this film and the tone it was trying to set. It utilized music in a way that was supposed to be the opposite of how the usual Disney fare does. It was definitely intentional that fairy tale creatures were dancing in tandem to Smash Mouth’s “I’m a Believer” at the end. That wasn’t put there because they randomly wanted a song to close out the film like it would often feel like with a lot of other animated movies.
While I’ve never actually had a problem with the animated dance ending troupe, I can at least recognize why other people don’t like it. There’s so little understanding or appreciation for context in them. Hotel Transylvania is a fine film but it only ended with Adam Sandler’s Dracula rapping on stage because that’s the way films like it tended to end by that point.
There’s not even a lot of pop songs in this film. It has two Smash Mouth songs and at one point it plays Bad Reputation. The only other song I recall them playing is Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah and that definitely is not a pop song.
Shockingly, the film still looks good. It looks really good actually. You can certainly tell it’s a little rough around the edges in some places but it held up upon repeat viewing in 2023.
If I had any criticisms I felt were worth talking about, one of them would be that John Lithgow and his performance as the villainous Lord Farquaad isn’t in it enough. He’s hilarious every time he’s on screen but because the plot is what it is it means he can’t be in it often. The movie only works because he sent the ogre off to get the princess for him. That’s fine. I’m naturally just going to want to see more of a really good, really well voice-acted villain even if I can’t personally find a way to fit them in more often in a natural way. This is less of a criticism and more of a fleeting wish.
It is a testament to Farquaad as a villain that despite his meager appearance he’s stood the test of time, being almost as big of a meme as Shrek himself. Also, apparently he’s Markiplier.
Other than that, really, it’s mostly just a well done, simple story at the end of the day. Its placement on this list isn’t a statement on there being too many things wrong with it. Films in Dreamworks catalog just undoubtedly go above and beyond what this film does and that includes other films within the Shrek franchise. Those films might even have more flaws than this one does but the good might just outway the bad in ways that the original Shrek can’t compete with.
It earns its place here as a staple of what it did for cinema as a fine, well told simple story with a twist. Nowadays, so much more has been achieved on the back of this film’s accomplishments and that’s a good thing.
| Viewed: |
24 times |
| Added: |
1 month ago
13 Apr 2025 03:20 CEST
|
|
|
