| Shrek | |
|---|---|
Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Andrew Adamson Vicky Jenson |
| Produced by | Jeffrey Katzenberg Aron Warner John H. Williams |
| Written by | |
| Based on | Shrek! by William Steig |
| Narrated by | Mike Myers |
| Starring | Mike Myers Eddie Murphy Cameron Diaz John Lithgow |
| Music by | Harry Gregson-Williams John Powell |
| Editing by | Sim Evan-Jones |
| Studio | DreamWorks Animation Pacific Data Images |
| Distributed by | DreamWorks Pictures (through Universal Pictures) |
| Release date(s) | May 18, 2001 |
| Running time | 92 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $60 million |
| Box office | $484,409,218[1] |
Shrek is a 2001 American computer-animated fantasy comedy film directed by Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jenson, featuring the voices of Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, Cameron Diaz, and John Lithgow. Loosely based on William Steig's 1990 fairy tale picture book Shrek!. Shrek stars Mike Myers as a big, strong, solitude-loving, intimidating ogre named Shrek; Cameron Diaz as the beautiful, feisty, but very down-to-earth Princess Fiona; Eddie Murphy as the talkative Donkey; and John Lithgow as the villain Lord Farquaad.
Commercially successful on release in 2001, it helped establish DreamWorks as a prime competitor to Pixar in the field of feature film animation, particularly in computer animation. The film's success also prompted DreamWorks Animation to create three sequels: Shrek 2, Shrek the Third, and Shrek Forever After. There was also a Christmas special called Shrek the Halls and a Halloween special called Scared Shrekless. Furthermore, Shrek was made the mascot for the company's animation productions. It was critically acclaimed as an animated film worthy of adult interest, with many adult-oriented jokes and themes but a simple enough plot and humor to appeal to children. It made notable use of popular music; the soundtrack includes music by Smash Mouth, Eels, Joan Jett, The Proclaimers, Jason Wade, The Baha Men, and John Cale (covering Leonard Cohen).
In June 2008, the American Film Institute revealed its "Ten top Ten"; the best ten films in ten "classic" American film genres—after polling over 1,500 people from the creative community Shrek was acknowledged as the eighth best film in the animated genre, and the only non-Disney·Pixar film on the top ten.[2][3] It is also third on Bravo's 100 funniest films. Shrek was also ranked second in a Channel 4 poll of the "100 Greatest Family Films", losing out on the top spot to E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.[4] In 2005, Shrek came sixth in Channel 4's 100 Greatest Cartoons poll behind The Simpsons, Tom and Jerry, South Park, Toy Story and Family Guy.
Shrek won the first ever Academy Award for Best Animated Feature and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. The film was also nominated for six BAFTAs, including the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for Eddie Murphy for his voice-over performance as Donkey, and won the BAFTA Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. The film's main (and title) character was awarded his own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
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Shrek, a grouchy green ogre that has always enjoyed living in peaceful solitude in his swamp, finds his life disrupted when numerous fairytale beings, including Pinocchio, the Three Little Pigs, and Donkey, are forced into the swamp by order of the obsessive, perfectionistic, fairy-tale despising Lord Farquaad.
Shrek leaves the swamp to ask Farquaad for the return of his privacy, with Donkey happily tagging along. Meanwhile, Farquaad tortures the Gingerbread Man into revealing the whereabouts of the remaining fairytale creatures until his guards rush in with an object Farquaad has been searching for: the Magic Mirror. The Mirror tells him that Farquaad can only become a real king by marrying a princess (completely disregarding his original question regarding if his kingdom was the fairest of them all). The Mirror gives him three princesses to choose from (in a parody of The Dating Game): Cinderella, Snow White, and Princess Fiona. Farquaad chooses Fiona and silences the Mirror before he can mention "the little thing that happens at night" (which is later revealed to be a curse).
Shrek and Donkey arrive at Farquaad's palace in Duloc, where they find themselves in the midst of a tournament. The winner will have the "privilege" of attempting to rescue Fiona from a castle surrounded by lava and protected by a fire-breathing dragon so that Farquaad may marry her. Shrek (with some help from Donkey) easily beats the other knights in a fashion that resembles a wrestling match and Farquaad agrees to remove the fairytale creatures from the swamp if Shrek rescues Fiona.
Shrek and Donkey travel to the castle and split up to find Fiona. Donkey encounters the dragon and sweet-talks the beast to save himself before discovering that the dragon is female. Dragon takes a liking to Donkey and carries him to her chambers. When Shrek finds Fiona, she is appalled at his lack of romanticism. As they are leaving, Shrek manages to save Donkey, caught in Dragon's tender clutches, and causing her to become irate, chasing Shrek, Fiona, and Donkey out of the castle. At first, Fiona is thrilled to be rescued but quickly becomes disappointed when Shrek takes his helmet off and she realises that he is an ogre. The three make their return journey to Farquaad's palace, with Shrek and Fiona finding they have more in common with each other along the way, and falling in love. However, at night, Fiona refuses to camp with them, taking shelter in a nearby cave until morning. Shrek and Donkey stay awake and watch the stars while Shrek informs Donkey that he plans to build a 10 foot wall around his swamp when he returns. When Donkey persistently asks Shrek why he is doing this, Shrek sadly confesses to him that everyone judges him before they know him; therefore, he feels he is better off alone, despite Donkey's admittance that he did not immediately judge him when they first met.
The next night, Fiona takes shelter in a nearby windmill. When Donkey hears strange noises coming from the windmill, he finds Fiona has turned into an ogress. Fiona explains she was cursed as a child and turns into an ogress every night, which is why she was locked away in the castle, and that only a kiss from her true love will return her to her "love's true form". Shrek, about to confess his feelings for Fiona, overhears part of their conversation, and is heartbroken as he misinterprets her disgust at her transformation into an "ugly beast" as being disgusted with him. Fiona makes Donkey promise not to tell Shrek about the spell, vowing to do it herself, but when the next morning comes, Shrek has brought Lord Farquaad to Fiona. The two return to the castle, while a hurt Shrek returns to the now-vacated swamp.
Shrek finds that, despite his privacy, he is miserable and misses Fiona. Donkey comes to the swamp, angry at Shrek, and Shrek reveals that he overheard their conversation. Donkey keeps his promise to Fiona and tells Shrek that she was talking about someone else. He then tells him that Fiona will be getting married shortly, urging Shrek into action to gain Fiona's true love. They are able to travel to Duloc quickly, thanks to Dragon, who had escaped her confines and followed Donkey. They interrupt the wedding before Farquaad can kiss Fiona, but not before the sun sets, which causes Fiona to turn into an ogress in front of everyone. While her transformation causes Shrek to fully understand what he overheard at the windmill, Farquaad, disgusted over the change, orders Shrek killed and Fiona imprisoned, but Shrek whistles for Dragon, who bursts in and devours Farquaad. Shrek and Fiona admit their love for each other and share a kiss; Fiona is bathed in light as her curse is broken, but is surprised to find that she has remained an ogress, as she "thought [she] was supposed to be[come] beautiful", to which Shrek replies that she is beautiful. The two of them get married in the swamp and depart on their honeymoon while the rest celebrate by singing "I'm a Believer".
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Shrek film series chronology |
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Shrek |
Cinderella, Snow White, Pied Piper, and several other characters are not speaking roles and are thus uncredited
Robin Williams, who had worked for Jeffrey Katzenberg before on Aladdin and had a bitter falling out with him and The Walt Disney Company over marketing agreements, has hinted in an interview that he refused a role in Shrek, because it would mean working for Katzenberg again. He would not state which role he had refused.[5]
Chris Farley was originally going to do the voice for Shrek and recorded 80 to 90% of the dialogue for the character, but died before the project was completed,[6] setting the project back for a while.[7] DreamWorks then re-cast the voice role to Mike Myers, who insisted on a complete script rewrite, to leave no traces of Farley's version of Shrek. After Myers had completed providing the voice for the character, when the film was well into production, he asked to re-record all of his lines in a Scottish accent similar to the one his mother had used when she told him bedtime stories.[8][9]
Myers has also employed a Scottish accent for a Saturday Night Live skit, a sketch in Wayne's World 2 and also for the characters Stuart MacKenzie in the motion picture So I Married an Axe Murderer, and Fat Bastard in Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me and Austin Powers in Goldmember.
Shrek was originally set up to be animated as stop-motion. The tests were too costly and the executives were not pleased with the overall look and lack of facial expression in the main character. A test was then shot on live-action background plate miniature sets and the main characters were composited into the scene as motion-captured computer graphics. Again, the results were not satisfactory, Katzenberg stating, "It looked terrible, it didn't work, it wasn't funny, and we didn't like it." The studio then turned to its production partners at PDI, who helped Shrek to get its final, computer-animated look.[8]
Early sketches of Shrek saw Shrek first living in a garbage dump near a human village called Wart Creek. It was also thought one time that he lived with his parents and kept rotting fish in his bedroom. These sketches were done in 1996 through 1997.[10] Donkey was modeled after Pericles, a real miniature donkey from Barron Park, Palo Alto, California.[11] Raman Hui, supervising animator of Shrek, did many different sketches for Princess Fiona and had done over 100 scupltures of Fiona before the directors picked the final design.[12]
Shrek received critical acclaim. Review aggregate Rotten Tomatoes reports that 89 percent of critics have given the film a positive review based on 176 reviews, with an average score of 7.7/10. The critical consensus is: While simultaneously embracing and subverting fairy tales, the irreverent Shrek also manages to tweak Disney's nose, provide a moral message to children, and offer viewers a funny, fast-paced ride.[13]
Roger Ebert praised the film, giving it four stars out of a possible four and describing it as "jolly and wicked, filled with sly in-jokes and yet somehow possessing a heart."[14]
The film earned $11,573,015 on its first day and $42,347,760 on its opening weekend, topping the box office for the weekend and averaging $11,805 from 3,587 theaters. In its second weekend, due to the Memorial Day Weekend holiday, the film gained 0.3 percent to $42,481,425 and $55,215,620 over the four-day weekend, resulting in an overall 30 percent gain. Despite this, the film finished in second place behind Pearl Harbor and had an average of $15,240 from expanding to 3,623 sites. In its third weekend, the film retreated 34 percent to $28,172,869 for a $7,695 average from expanding to 3,661 theaters. The film closed on December 6, 2001, after grossing $267,665,011 domestically along with $216,744,207 overseas for a worldwide total of $484,409,218. Produced on a $60 million budget, the film was a huge box office smash and is the fourth-highest-grossing film of 2001 behind Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring and Monsters Inc.
At the Oscars, Shrek won the first ever Academy Award For Best Animated Feature, beating Monsters, Inc. and Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius. Entertainment Weekly put it on its end-of-the-decade, "best-of" list, saying, "Prince Charming? So last millennium. This decade, fairy-tale fans--and Princess Fiona--fell for a fat and flatulent Ogre. Now, that's progress."[15]
Shrek was also nominated for 6 BAFTA Award, including the BAFTA Award for Best Film. Eddie Murphy became the first actor to ever receive a BAFTA nomination for a voice-over performance. The film was also nominated for Best Visual Effects, Best Sound, Best Film Music, and won the BAFTA Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.
American Film Institute recognition:
The film was entered into the 2001 Cannes Film Festival.[16]
Previous films and TV shows, such as Fractured Fairy Tales and The Princess Bride, have parodied the traditional fairy tale. However, Shrek itself has noticeably influenced the current generation of mainstream animated films. Particularly after Shrek 2, animated films began to incorporate more pop culture references and end-film musical numbers. Such elements can be seen in films like Ice Age: The Meltdown, Robots, and Chicken Little. It also inspired a number of computer animated films which also spoofed fairy tales, or other related story genres, often including adult-oriented humor, most of which were not nearly as successful as Shrek, such as Happily N'Ever After, Doogal, Igor, and Hoodwinked!.[17]
The film was released on VHS and DVD on November 2, 2001. A 3D-converted version of the film was released on Blu-ray 3D on December 1, 2010, along with its first, second, and third sequels.[18] Shrek in the Swamp Karaoke Dance Party! is a 2001 3-minute musical short film, included on Shrek VHS and the Shrek 2-Disc Special Edition DVD. It takes up right after the Shrek's ending, with film's characters performing a medley of modern pop songs.[19]
Several video game adaptations of the film have been published on various game console platforms.
In 2003, Dark Horse Comics released a Shrek three-issue mini-series comic book adaptation, which was collected into a trade paperback.[20]
A musical version, based on the film, with music by Jeanine Tesori and a book and lyrics by David Lindsay-Abaire, opened on Broadway on December 14, 2008, and closed January 3, 2010, running for a total of 441 performances. It starred Brian d'Arcy James in the title role, Sutton Foster as Princess Fiona, Christopher Sieber as Lord Farquaad, Daniel Breaker as Donkey, and John Tartaglia as Pinocchio. The musical received many Tony Award nominations and won the 2009 Tony Award for Best Costume Design. A North American Tour opened July 25, 2010, in Chicago. A London production opened in the West End on June 7, 2011.[21]
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