Ogre and out...?

Rating: 7/10 (22 August 2008)

It took me a while to catch up with the third edition of the money-spinning "Shrek" franchise and I was vaguely aware of a less than positive critical, if not popular response, to it but was pleasantly surprised with the product on show. Okay, it's pick-your-cliché from "the law of diminishing returns", "familiarity breeding contempt" and "too much of a good thing", but hey, I still like these characters and whilst I now would doubt whether the characters and situations can be developed any further at least on the big-screen, it's certainly been one of the better trilogies of recent years. The graphics and animations are as before so good as to make you think you're wearing 3D spex and the story, while contrived (I'm not quite sure how Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table actually qualify as classic children's fairy-tale or cartoon favourites) shares the laughs around before winding up at the by now familiar happy-ending finish with a romp-out to a classic track from yesteryear, this time Sly Stone's funk-tastic "Thank you...". Best moments are the Gingerbread Man's life flashing before him in a (threatened) pre-death moment and the four Disney princesses (plus one ugly step-sister!) giving it some attitude as they find liberation (even burning a bra symbolically, in the process). Best line, as usual, goes to Eddie Murphy's Donkey "I'm being attacked by an ogre - with issues!". There aren't as many outright belly-laughs as in the peerless first "Shrek", you feel that Shrek and Fiona are more bit-players in their own movie (I can't believe I'm humanising animated characters!) and occasionally you're made to wait for the next really good joke (Eric Idle's Merlin and Justin Timberlake's Arthur don't exactly leap off the page/screen either), so yes, this outing of the not-so-jolly green giant, may not be as good as its predecessors but that's down to the lack of surprise at revisiting these stock characters and, heck, they were mighty good predecessors!