SPOILER -- Vastly overrated movie series

Rating: Null/10 (19 August 2004)

Shrek and its sequel are bland, trite, uncreative, wannabe-witty, and boring, but, inexplicably, both critics and audiences adore them. I've seen good movies, and Shrek is just not a good movie. Shrek is the Craig Kilborn of movies: it's smug and self-satisfied in its so-called irreverent attitude, while it faithfully repeats all the clichés it purports to lampoon.
**SPOILER AHEAD**
How many viewers under the age of 4 didn't see the ending of Shrek (or Shrek 2) lumbering up Fifth Avenue? What a surprise! The princess chooses to be ugly! How incredibly irreverent in the most mind-numbingly politically correct way! What's the moral here? Be yourself? What attitude! What originality! Hamlet, step aside.
**NOW LEAVING SPOILER ZONE**
Hey, I know! Let's make a movie starring a kind-hearted but misunderstood hero with a witty, flippant sidekick! Never been done before. Oh wait, it has, but that's OK, because we're satirizing Disney! Let's fill it full of jokes that the parents will get but the kids won't! What a concept! Have we forgotten so soon what true attitude in kids' movies can be like? Can Shrek hold a candle to anything created by Jim Henson? I guess in the 21st century, jokes about bodily functions count as wit and attitude.
Shrek is product, plain and simple. Take big-name actors, throw in some snipes at Disney, throw in some crude jokes. But we have to make sure the movie succeeds: follow the standard cartoon movie story. Oh, we also have to make sure we don't offend anyone: Give it four or five passes through the political correctness machine.
I have to say that Eddie Murphy as the sidekick is funny. Restrained and subdued in a strange way, like the rest of the movie, but still funny. And Mike Myers does a decent job with the Scottish accent. I've seen many worse movies than Shrek; it's just that the obsequious fawning that everyone does is finally starting to get to me (can you tell?)
I just got back from lunch at the food court and the Bourbon Chicken place has a sign above it that reads: "It's not spicy! You'll love it!"
I guess Shrek is also the Bourbon Chicken of movies.