The movie that rates itself: The Third.

Rating: 5/10 (19 May 2007)

Paul McCartney is a great songwriter. Let me just get that out of the way. But he isn't perfect. Take for example the song, "Live and Let Die", a song he wrote in the '70s for a Bond movie of the same name. The song is used briefly in Dreamworks' latest outing for everyone's favorite Scots ogre. In the song he actually wrote this line: "But if in this ever changing world in which we live in". "In which we live in"? Was he kidding? A great talent, but that is some lazy songwriting. I figure he was either exhausted, or under contract, as opposed to being inspired.
And that's the problem with this entire movie. The writing is simply not up to par. The story is loaded down with so many different elements that it is impossible to develop any of them. You can almost see the writers thinking, "Okay, now we've got a bunch of stuff for Shrek, Donkey, and Puss to do. Let's put in some stuff for Fiona and Lillian here..." The result is that there's a script, but no real story. And the dialog with some exceptions, is full of the clichés they so happily lampooned in earlier Shreks. The result comes across as a 3rd or 4th draft.
Andrew Adamson directed the previous two Shreks and has one of the writing credits here, but he did not direct it. I guess the franchise is so important now that it must be handled by two directors, neither of whom has Adamson's knack for timing. At various points in the evening, the pace was surprisingly ponderous.
It's not unpleasant, as movies go. It's just disappointing when such an average film continues a series of such good ones.