Shrek 2

***Shrek 2*** is a 2004 American computer-animated, comedy film directed by Andrew Adamson, Kelly Asbury and Conrad Vernon. It is the sequel to 2001's *Shrek* and the second installment in the *Shrek* film franchise. The film stars Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy and Cameron Diaz, who reprise their respective voice roles of Shrek, Donkey, and Fiona. They are joined by new characters voiced by Antonio Banderas, Julie Andrews, John Cleese, Rupert Everett, and Jennifer Saunders. *Shrek 2* takes place following the events of the first film, with Shrek and Donkey meeting Fiona's parents as her zealous Fairy Godmother, who wants Fiona to marry her son Prince Charming, plots to destroy Shrek and Fiona's marriage. Shrek and Donkey team up with a swashbuckling cat named Puss in Boots to foil her plans.

Development began in 2001, and following disagreements with producers, the screenwriters from the first film were replaced with Adamson. The story was inspired by *Guess Who's Coming to Dinner* (1967), and new animation tools were utilized to improve the visual appearance of each character, particularly Puss in Boots. The lead actors also received a significant bump in salary to $10 million, which at the time was among the highest contracts in their respective careers.

*Shrek 2* premiered at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival, where it competed for the Palme d'Or, and it was released in theatres on May 19, 2004. Met with favorable reviews like its predecessor, the film grossed $919.8 million worldwide. It scored the second-largest, three-day opening weekend in US history and the largest opening for an animated film at the time of its release. It went on to become the highest-grossing film of 2004 worldwide. *Shrek 2* is also DreamWorks' most successful film to date, and it held the title of being the highest-grossing animated film of all time worldwide until *Toy Story 3* surpassed it in 2010. The film received two Academy Award nominations for Best Animated Feature and Best Original Song, and its associated soundtrack reached the Top 10 on the US *Billboard* 200. A sequel entitled *Shrek the Third* was released in 2007.

## Plot

Following the events of the previous film, Shrek and Fiona return from their honeymoon to find they have been invited by Fiona's parents to a royal ball to celebrate their marriage. Shrek refuses to go at first, but Fiona talks him into it, and along with Donkey, they travel to the kingdom of Far Far Away. They meet Fiona's parents, King Harold and Queen Lillian, who are shocked to see both their daughter and son-in-law are ogres, with Harold particularly repulsed. At dinner, Shrek and Harold get into a heated argument over how Shrek and Fiona will raise their family, and Fiona, disgusted at Shrek and Harold's behavior, locks herself away in her room that evening. Shrek worries that he has lost his true love, particularly after finding her childhood diary and reading that she was once infatuated with Prince Charming.

Harold is reprimanded by the Fairy Godmother and her son Prince Charming by reminding him that Charming was to marry Fiona in exchange for his own happy ending, where he was transformed from a frog into a human in order to marry Lillian. She implores him to find a way of getting rid of Shrek. Harold arranges for Shrek and Donkey to join him on a fictitious hunting trip, which is actually a trap to lure them into the hands of an assassin, Puss in Boots. Unable to defeat Shrek, Puss reveals that he was paid by Harold and offers to come along and make amends. The three sneak into the Fairy Godmother's potion factory and steal a "Happily Ever After" potion that Shrek thinks will restore Fiona's love for him.

Shrek and Donkey both drink the potion and fall into a deep sleep, awakening the next morning to discover its effects: Shrek is now a handsome man while Donkey has turned into an elegant white stallion. In order "to make the change permanent", Shrek must kiss Fiona "by midnight". Shrek, Donkey and Puss return to the castle to discover that the potion has transformed Fiona back into her former human self as well. However, the Fairy Godmother, having discovered the potion's theft, intercepts Shrek and sends Charming to pose as him and win Fiona's love. At the Fairy Godmother's urging, Shrek leaves the castle, thinking that the best way to make Fiona happy is to let her go.

To ensure that Fiona falls in love with Charming, the Fairy Godmother gives Harold a love potion to put into Fiona's tea. This exchange is overheard by Shrek, Donkey and Puss, who are arrested by the royal guards and thrown into a dungeon. While the royal ball begins, several of Shrek's friends band together to free the trio with the help of The Muffin Man's monster-sized gingerbread man, which breaks through the castle's defenses. Shrek is too late to prevent Charming from kissing Fiona, however, but instead of falling in love with Charming, Fiona knocks him out with a headbutt. Harold reveals that he never gave Fiona the love potion, whereupon the now-enraged Fairy Godmother attacks Shrek. In the ensuing melee, Harold sacrifices himself to save Shrek: his armor ricochets a spell cast by the Fairy Godmother which disintegrates her, but as a result, Harold is turned back into the Frog Prince. Harold gives his blessing to the marriage and apologizes for his earlier behavior, admitting his use of the Happily Ever After potion years earlier.

As the clock strikes midnight, Shrek and Fiona happily let the potion's effects wear off and revert to their ogre forms, while Donkey changes back to his natural form as well. In the mid-credits scene, Dragon, who had previously romanced and married Donkey reveals that they now have several dragon-donkey hybrid babies, much to his surprise.

## Voice cast

* Mike Myers as Shrek
* Eddie Murphy as Donkey
* Cameron Diaz as Princess Fiona
* Julie Andrews as Queen Lillian
* Antonio Banderas as Puss in Boots
* John Cleese as King Harold
* Rupert Everett as Prince Charming
* Jennifer Saunders as Fairy Godmother
* Joan Rivers (US) and Kate Thornton (UK) as Red Carpet Announcer
* Larry King (US) and Jonathan Ross (UK) as Doris the Ugly Stepsister
* Aron Warner as Big Bad Wolf
* Cody Cameron as Pinocchio and The Three Little Pigs
* Christopher Knights and Simon J. Smith as Three Blind Mice
* Conrad Vernon as Gingerbread Man, Muffin Man, Mongo, Cedric and Announcer
* Chris Miller as Magic Mirror
* Mark Moseley as Dresser
* Kelly Cooney as Fast Food Clerk
* Kelly Asbury as Page; Elf, Nobleman and Nobleman's son
* Andrew Adamson as Captain of the Guard

### Cameos

* Joan Rivers' cameo marked the first time that a real person had been represented on screen by the *Shrek* animation team. Her part (though retaining her visual representation) was redubbed by presenter Kate Thornton for the United Kingdom release.
* On the DVD special features and in the U.S. edition VHS (just before the credits), Simon Cowell appears as himself on *Far Far Away Idol*, a parody of *American Idol*. (see Home Media)

### ADR Loop Group

* Newell Alexander
* Tom Amundsen
* Steve Apostolina
* Kelly Asbury
* Bob Bergen
* Terry Brannon
* Rodger Bumpass
* Mitch Carter
* Robert Clotworthy
* David Cowgill
* Jennifer Darling
* Debi Derryberry
* Paul Eiding
* Iake Eissinmann
* Bill Farmer
* Bridget Hoffman
* Sherry Lynn
* Danny Mann
* Mickie McGowan
* Chris Miller
* Edie Mirman
* Laraine Newman
* Paul Pape
* Jan Rabson
* Erika Thomas
* Marcelo Tubert
* Conrad Vernon
* Jim Ward

## Production

In 2001, soon after the original *Shrek* proved to be a hit, Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy and Cameron Diaz negotiated an upfront payment of $10 million each for voicing a sequel to the film. That was significant rise from the $350,000 salary they were paid for the first film. According to Jeffrey Katzenberg, the executive producer of *Shrek 2* and a co-founder of DreamWorks, who led the negotiations, the payments were probably the highest in the actors' entire careers. Each of the actors were expected to work between 15 and 18 hours in total. The film was produced with a US$70 million budget.

The screenwriters for the first film, Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio, insisted the film to be a traditional fairytale, but after disagreements with the producers, they left the project and were replaced by director Andrew Adamson. His writing of the film was inspired from *Guess Who's Coming to Dinner*, with the help of the co-directors for the film, who had spent most of the film's production in Northern California while Adamson spent most of the time with the voice actors in Glendale, California.

DreamWorks began production in 2001, which was actually before the first film was even completed. DreamWorks made sure there was something new to see in *Shrek 2* by putting more human characters in the film than there were in its predecessor and improving their appearance, with the use of a few systems that dealt with hair and fur to improve its appearance and movement. The set up for all the characters was done in the first three years of production. Puss in Boots required a whole new set of tools in the film to handle his fur, belt and feather plume in his hat. The character also required an upgrade in the fur shader for his introduction in the film.

In an early version of *Shrek 2*, Shrek abdicated the throne, and called for a fairy tale election. Pinocchio's campaign was the "honesty" campaign, while Gingy's was a "smear" campaign. Director Andrew Adamson said it was overtly satiric and political, with many funny ideas, but "it was more intellectual than emotional".

According to production designer Guillaume Aretos, *Shrek 2* appeared to be a lot darker than the original film; "There are a lot of medieval paintings and illustrations that we used quite a bit also. Other than that there are my own influences, which are classical paintings from the 15th and 16th centuries, but those are not as direct. In fact, nothing was absolutely direct. The design of Shrek is always a twist on reality anyway, so we tried to [pack] as much detail and interest as we could in the imagery."

## Soundtrack

The film's soundtrack features the song "Accidentally in Love" by Counting Crows, which the band's singer and songwriter Adam Duritz believes "fits into the movie because it's the story of people who fall in love who weren't supposed to fall in love." The soundtrack was composed by Harry Gregson-Williams.

## Release

In April 2004, the film was selected for to compete for the Palme d'Or at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival.

*Shrek 2* was originally scheduled for release on June 18, 2004. The film was then moved forward from June 18, 2004, to May 21, 2004; however, due to "fan demand", it was released two days earlier from May 21, 2004, to May 19, 2004. A day before the film went to theaters, the first five minutes were shown on Nickelodeon's *U-Pick Live*.

Playing in 4,163 theaters over its first weekend in the United States, *Shrek 2* was the first film with over 4,000 theaters in overall count; over 3,700 theaters was its count for an opening day.

In July 2014, the film's distribution rights were purchased by DreamWorks Animation from Paramount Pictures (owners of the pre-2005 DreamWorks Pictures catalog) and transferred to 20th Century Fox before reverting to Universal Studios in 2018.

### Home media

*Shrek 2* was released on VHS and DVD on November 5, 2004 and on Game Boy Advance Video on November 17, 2005. A 3D-converted version of the film was released exclusively with select Samsung television sets on Blu-ray on December 1, 2010, along with the other three films of the series. A non-3D version was released on December 7, 2010, as part of *Shrek: The Whole Story*, and a stand-alone Blu-ray/DVD combo pack was released individually on August 30, 2011, along with the other two films of the series. A stand-alone 3D Blu-ray version of the film was released on November 1, 2011. The DVD release features two full-length commentary tracks, one by co-directors Conrad Vernon and Kelly Asbury, and a second by producer Aron Warner and editor Michael Andrews.

#### *Far Far Away Idol*

*Far Far Away Idol* is a special feature on the DVD and VHS release based on *American Idol* and guest starring Simon Cowell. Taking place right after *Shrek 2* ends, the short features characters from *Shrek* compete in a sing-off while being judged by Shrek, Fiona, and Cowell.

After the performances, on the DVD release, the viewer gets to pick the winner. However, if any character outside of Shrek (along with Princess Fiona), Donkey, or Puss were selected, Cowell would refuse to accept the winner and proclaim himself the victor, leaping onto a table and performing his "own" rendition of "My Way". At the end of the VHS release, it gives a link to a website where the viewer can vote for their favorite to determine the ultimate winner. DreamWorks Animation announced on November 8, 2004, three days after the DVD and VHS release, that after over 750,000 votes cast, the winner of the competition was Doris.

## Reception

### Box office

The film opened at #1 with a Friday-to-Sunday total of $108 million, and $129 million since its Wednesday launch, from a then-record 4,163 theaters, for an average of $25,952 per theater over the weekend. At the time *Shrek 2*'s Friday-to-Sunday total was the second-highest opening weekend, only trailing *Spider-Man*'s $114.8 million. In addition, Saturday alone managed to obtain $44.8 million, making it the highest single-day gross at the time, beating *Spider-Man*'s first Saturday gross of $43.6 million. The film remained at No. 1 in its second weekend, grossing another $95.6 million over the four-day Memorial Day weekend, narrowly beating out the $85.8 million four-day tally of new opener *The Day After Tomorrow*. It spent ten weeks in the weekly Top 10 and remaining there until July 29, and stayed in theaters for 149 days (roughly twenty-one weeks), closing on November 25, 2004. The film was released in the United Kingdom on July 2, 2004, and topped the country's box office for the next two weekends, before being dethroned by *Spider-Man 2*.

The film grossed $441.2 million domestically (US and Canada) and $478.6 million in foreign markets for a total of $919.8 milion worldwide, making it the highest-grossing film of both 2004 and in its franchise. This also puts the film at 14th on the all-time domestic box office list and 42nd on the worldwide box office list. The film sold an estimated 71,050,900 tickets in the US.

The film also took away the highest worldwide gross made by an animated feature, which was before held by *Finding Nemo* (2003), although the latter still had a higher overseas-only gross. With DVD sales and *Shrek 2* merchandise estimated to total almost $800 million, the film (which was produced with a budget of $150 million) is DreamWorks' most profitable film to date.

*Shrek 2* remained the highest-grossing animated film worldwide until the release of *Toy Story 3* (201)0, and held the record for the highest-grossing animated film at the North American box office until the release of *Finding Dory* (2016) as well as the highest-grossing non-Disney animated film at this box office until the release of *Toy Story 3* (in 2010), Disney's 3D re-releases of *The Lion King* (in 2011) and *Finding Nemo* (in 2012), *Despicable Me 2* (in 2013), Disney's *Frozen* (also in 2013), *Minions* (in 2015), *Zootopia* (in 2016), *Finding Dory* (also in 2016), ,*Despicable Me 3* (in 2017) and *Incredibles 2* (in 2018) respectively, surpassed *Shrek 2* and relegated it as the sixteenth-highest-grossing animated film of all time.

### Critical response

On film review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 88% based on 234 reviews, with an average rating of 7.7/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "It may not be as fresh as the original, but topical humor and colorful secondary characters make *Shrek 2* a winner in its own right." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 75 out of 100, based on 40 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

## Other media

### Video games

* *Shrek 2* (*Shrek 2: Team Action*) (2004)
* *Shrek 2 Activity Center: Twisted Fairy Tale Fun* (2004)
* *Shrek 2: Beg for Mercy* (2004)
* *Shrek Super Slam* (2005)
* *Shrek Smash n' Crash Racing* (2006)

## Sequels and spin-offs

*Main article: Shrek (franchise)*
*Shrek 2* has two sequels; they are *Shrek the Third* and *Shrek Forever After*. A spin-off film *Puss in Boots* was released on October 28, 2011, and focuses on the character of Puss in Boots, who was introduced in this film.