Media Essay - Shrek

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Media essay – Shrek

What is a fairytale? Most people would say a fairytale is a magical adventure story, were anything is possible. A damsel in distress trapped by an evil witch (or other nasty creatures such as a dragon) is rescued by a daring prince on a magnificent steed. A fairytale that fits this perception is Rapunzel who is locked away in a tower by a conniving witch and then rescued by a handsome prince; typically the story ends with their marriage and happily ever after. In my essay I am going to explore the film ‘Shrek’ and how it differs from a traditional fairytale. By analysing and comparing the main characters, Shrek, Donkey and Lord Farquaard. I will comment upon the camera angles, lighting and music, and how these contribute towards the change in the story. As DreamWorks’ film critics said this film is truly “The Greatest Fairytale Never Told!”

The film starts as you would expect a fairytale to begin. An old book opens and a smooth, Scottish voice reads the old English typeface.

It goes on to tell a story about a beautiful princess that had been cursed and locked away in a tower guarded by a terrible fire breathing dragon and the only way the curse could be broken was by ‘true love and true love’s first kiss’.  This gives us the impression that ‘Shrek’ is going to be a traditional fairytale until a big, green hand appears ripping out the page and violently snapping the book shut, joking “Like that’s ever gonna happen!” You hear a chain flush and the song All Stars – by SmashMouth begins to play as we see Shrek for the first time emerging out of the toilet with a page from the book attached to his foot. Shrek looks like a normal ogre; big, green and ugly. He looks around and you see Shrek’s home for the first time it looks comfortable, with the lighting focusing on the house creating an almost ‘grotto’ effect. He begins to perform his regular ‘hygiene’ routine. He brushes his teeth with bug guts and smiles crookedly into the mirror causing it to smash; he also bathes in the pond where he kills a fish. He sits at a table to eat with cutlery and a feast of a meal. He has a lit candle and a martini looking cocktail. He looks very civilised and has great etiquette for an ogre. This is defiantly not your traditional expectation of an ogre. You would expect an ogre to live in a cave or shack in the middle of deep, dark woods and have no table manners, eat raw meat and drink out of a muddy old puddle. However when the villagers attempt to capture him Shrek appears to be a traditional ogre. We have close up of the villagers feet running and a silhouette of Shrek tiptoeing behind them. Shrek threatens them by saying he will ‘make a soup from your freshly peeled skin’, ‘shave your livers’ and ‘squeeze the jelly from your eyes’. One of the villagers tries to threaten Shrek by waving his torch frantically in front of him. Shrek licks his fingers and puts the torch out. You see the frightened look on the villagers’ face, just before Shrek roars and we have an extreme close up of his mouth and can see the flying saliva. The villager’s torches are blown out and again we have a silhouette of Shrek’s face and his smirk. The villagers run away and Shrek laughs. At this point in the film the audience are in two minds about Shrek not knowing whether he is your standard nasty ogre or something completely different.

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When we first see Donkey his owner is preparing to sell him, you hear him constantly talk about how he will “never be stubborn again”. He then stops talking when his owner tries to sell him to the knights, when the knights take Donkey’s owner away fairy dust from Tinkerbell falls onto him, he smiles as he begins to fly away and says “you may have seen a house fly maybe even a superfly but I bet you ain’t never seen a donkey fly!” which at this point he falls back to the floor, where the knights then proceed ...

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