Medi-ogre 4
Latest 'Shrek' won't leave anyone happy ever after
By Carl Kozlowski 05/20/2010
The new billboards for the Shrek franchise’s fourth and hopefully final film, “Shrek Forever After,” feature the lovable green hero helplessly tied down by the nefarious Rumpelstiltskin, Shrek’s worried eyes expressing the thought behind the phrase “What the Shrek Just Happened?”
Indeed, fans of the series may wonder that very same thing after watching the new adventures of Mike Myers’ cartoon alter-ego, which, alas, are not all that adventurous.
When “Shrek” first hit theaters in 2001, it created a worldwide sensation with a new and daring standard for animated films, balancing the entertainment needs of children with those of adults and, in the process, reaping $400 million in box office revenue. “Shrek 2” scored even higher with audiences, exploding to more than $900 million in ticket sales and ascending to stratospheric heights as one of the top-grossing films of all time.
Then the magic started wearing off come 2007’s “Shrek the Third,” with receipts tumbling back into the low hundreds of millions range. But that clearly didn’t worry the folks at DreamWorks, which has now trotted out Shrek and his band of eccentric friends and family in 3D, but all without ever bothering to give the script much thought.
The original “Shrek” featured some of the best vocal work from stars in an animated flick, and a wickedly funny nonstop lampooning of Disney films and fairy tales. It also had a pretty good script involving a rousing and expertly done adventure tale featuring Shrek and Donkey, played by Eddie Murphy, fighting off a dragon to save Princess Fiona, played by Cameron Diaz.
The second film has plenty of fans, including some who like it even better than the first, but it kept the laughs coming without as much adventure. In part two, Shrek mainly had to contend with having royalty as family and the personality conflicts that the situation provided. Conflictwise, the Fairy Godmother tried to upend his love life by attempting to use potions and trickery to get Prince Charming to marry Princess Fiona instead of Shrek.
No. 3 featured Shrek mainly facing the dilemma of whether to become an heir to the throne of Fiona’s family or go back to his simpler life in the swamp. There was way too much sappy dialogue in this episode and not nearly enough action and funny moments.
And that was a problem that appears to have only gotten worse in this latest effort.
Here, Shrek feels trapped by domestic life and is so desperate to cut loose as an ogre again — if only for just one day — that he signs a deal with the ruthlessly magical Rumpelstiltskin for just that purpose. But there’s always a catch in fairy tale deals. The twist in this case is that Shrek has to give up a different day of his life in exchange for gaining the day he desires, and he accidentally gives up the day he was born.
This, of course, sets off ramifications throughout Shrek’s entire world, somehow not killing him, but forcing his life and all of his relationships to turn out completely different and much, much darker and sadder. Along the way to setting things right, there are a few slapstick set pieces, but as with far too many of the current wave of 3D films, things here seem to get frenzied solely to create a whiz-bang effect.
Ultimately, “Shrek Forever After” actually comes off as quite maudlin, with its drawn-out examination of Shrek’s life, rather than allowing him to finally regain the anarchic, anything-goes spirit that spawned the series.
With Diaz and especially Murphy being underutilized in comparison to previous performances, this feels like a paycheck more than a serious creative endeavor.
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