The film was the only animated cartoony type film that I have ever seen in many years and it has proved me wrong and that I was too critical about these animated films. Shrek is a movie that had me laughing quite a lot and there was always something entertaining happening.
The thing that amazed me was it was not only entertaining for me yet it had enough to keep people of older ages entertained as well, as there are a number of jokes that only adults will get. It is a humorous film which has adventure, comedy and romance all combined in it.
The Film begins with us meeting Shrek in his swamp where he lives alone and very much likes it that way. Things for him are just going fine until he finds out that all the lands fairytale characters have been forced to move in to his swamp. He obviously gets very angry with this and he goes out to to find who is responsible, Lord Farquaad (voiced by John Lithgow) to get things back to the way they were. In order to do that Shrek is sent out on a mission to rescue a princess so that Lord Farquaad can become King of the Land. Unwillingly he accepts the quest in order to get his land back and sets off with a loudmouth talkative donkey (voiced by Eddie Murphy). Soon enough Shrek falls in love with the princess but there was one problem with Princess Fiona but that still didn’t stop Shrek from liking her anyway. The plot is easy enough to follow and it is very unpredictable with enough twists to keep us entertained.
The characters looked extremely realistic unlike other animated films and the character who looked most realistic was none other than Princess Fiona (Voice by Cameron Diaz). I thought that she resembled Cameron Diaz quite well. Shrek was quite a sad unhappy ogre who had covered up his real feelings in all his life but now slowly he is letting it out and soon you start sympathising with him. The funniest character had to be the donkey with his continuous snide remarks about Shrek.
It had a sort of fairytale rhythm to it as they had to rescue a princess from a castle and have to slay the dragon in the process. But soon the traditional fairytale elements had been twisted and the prince became Shrek rather than a handsome young man. Shrek had shook the princess awake and took his on his shoulder rather than a kiss to awake her. This was very unorthodox to the fairytale genre however this was not a proper fairytale. So they go on and Princess Fiona who should be a polite, sensitive princess suddenly gets snatched from Shrek by Robin Hood. This princess started fighting him, that’s not normal, a princess fighting? So then again it shows us that it is trying to be different and being very unpredictable so it can give Disney a run for their money.
The thing that makes this film so funny is that it manages to repeatedly mock fairy tales and keep it fresh throughout the entire film. The voices of Eddie Murphy and Mike Myers were excellent as their vocal expressions were extremely realistic and it seemed like they really enjoyed themselves while doing the voices on Shrek. It is a great family film containing a message or a moral to the story that is given in a way that you do not feel it is too obvious but you have to work it out for yourself and are likely to understand it if you watch the entire movie.
I think the moral was “you will fall in love for what is on the inside rather than the outside”.
While the little kids will not understand many of the jokes there is enough humour in it for them to have a good time from beginning to end with a few songs as well.
The Director of this film have also created the movie, The Stepdaughter, Batman & Robin, A time to Kill, Batman Forever and more. This movie was very different from all his other films as this was an animated one. All the other ones were serious and this was a very different type of film. He did a good job at making Shrek very unique and enabling it so it has a wide range of audiences.
I have to say that the songs in the movie were exceptional. The music helps hugely to create atmosphere in the film and the dancing is very realistic and it all looks very professional. The music itself sounds very nice.
The ending was quite predictable however the way it ended in a karaoke was excellent showing us that the film had a happy ending like a normal fairytale but then had it’s own unique way of ending unlike other fairytales or normal movies.
The reason I rated it 4 out of 5 is that I think the ending was quite rushed and I would’ve wanted to see Shrek and Fiona’s married life to see if they got on even if the film had to run for longer. But I assume that they will show all that in the sequel if there is one, “Shrek2”.
Zakir Md. Hussain 10TR
