Ginger and I watched Shrek the Third a while back. I actually bought the DVD of this one rather than rent it through Netflixs. I'll admit it was a risky move since I had never seen it and sequels of this nature tend to simply be rehashes of the previous films. But I had enjoyed the previous Shreks (the first more than the second) and figured that I would probably want this one as a matching set to the other two which I also own. They seem to simply throw jokes out constantly and hope something works. Luckily most of the time it does. But every scene will have some physical comedy, some verbal wordplay or just humorous situations occurring in the background. The story isn't anything overly original, but there is a lot going on simultaneously. This time out the King is dying, and Shrek will be crowned ruler of the Kingdom (a role he doesn't want), unless he embarks on a quest to locate one of the King's distant relatives named (wait for it...) Artie. Yes, the legen ... dary King Arthur makes his first appearance in Shrek continuity, and to their credit I really didn't even notice it was Justin Timberlake doing the voice (kudos to those who get the "How I Met Your Mother" reference I threw in there). But wait, oh no, while Shrek is off gathering Artie the vile Prince Charming is rallying the villains to form an uprising and take over the Kingdom of Far, Far Away. Oh, and to add to the abundance of plotlines Princess Fiona is preggers and we get to see Shrek dealing with the idea of being a Dad.
There's lot of fan service going on also as some of the more popular minor characters from previous movies make their token appearance here also. Although I will admit that the scene where Pinocchio is interrogated I found absolutely hilarious. Puss in Boots has gravitated from his role as a support character in the second movie to full fledged confidant and traveling companion in this movie. I seem to recall I wasn't as fond of the second Shrek movie as I was the original, and this one is probably on par with the second one and maybe slightly worse. That's not to say it's bad, since it's all relative. Plus there are a couple bits of pure comedy gold in this one that make it worthwhile (the previously mentioned Pinocchio scene and later Eric Idle as the absent minded Merlin both come to mind). Possibly the one bad thing about the movie is that as we continue the sequels and recurring characters all jockey for screen time Shrek is starting to feel like a guest star in his own movie.
2 comments:
This was a terrible movie. I loved the first, was "meh" on the second, and slept through the third one. I actually slept in the theater.
If you slept through it how can you accurately say the entire movie was terrible? I do think it was the worst of the three, but there were still some comedy gold in it here and there (mostly there I admit).
Post a Comment