In a sentenceAn ogre’s midlife crisis, a cat that has let itself go, and the first film told again with the lights down
Shrek (Mike Myers) has the life he once fought for: a swamp, Princess Fiona (Cameron Diaz), three ogre babies and a tour bus every morning full of people who want to hear him roar. He is bored to the bone. At the children’s birthday party he loses his temper, and in the woods afterwards he meets Rumpelstiltskin (Walt Dohrn), a small dealmaker with a cart of contracts, who offers him one day as a real ogre in exchange for one day from his childhood. Shrek signs. He wakes in a Far Far Away where Rumpelstiltskin is king, witches hunt ogres from broomsticks, Donkey (Eddie Murphy) pulls a witch’s wagon and does not know him, Puss in Boots (Antonio Banderas) has grown fat on a cushion, and Fiona leads an ogre resistance. He has until sunrise to undo the deal.
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The fourth Shrek is a clear improvement on the third: smaller, better tempered, with a decent villain and an alternative Far Far Away worth the visit. It is also the first film’s story run again, and it knows it.
Three films in, Shrek has a swamp, a wife, three babies and a problem the people who make these films seem to have shared: nothing left to want. Shrek Forever After is about that. It opens on an ogre whose days have become the same day, and then it lets him sign them away. It is a clear step up from Shrek the Third (2007), and it is also the first film’s story told again with the colours turned down.
The first twenty minutes are the best written thing the series has done since the second film. Darren Lemke and Josh Klausner give Shrek a day and then make him live it on a loop: the babies wake him, the tour bus arrives, a stranger asks him to do the roar, the outhouse door comes off in his hand. Nick Fletcher cuts the loop a little shorter each time round, so the joke is in the editing as much as the script, and by the third pass we felt the trap close.
Enter Rumpelstiltskin, voiced by Walt Dohrn as a small, needy man with a different wig for every mood. He offers Shrek one day as a proper ogre, feared and free, in exchange for one day from his past, and Shrek signs without reading. The world he wakes into is where Peter Zaslav earns his credit. Far Far Away’s castle has gone to ruin, the sky is the grey of washing-up water, witches patrol on broomsticks and run ogres in chain gangs, and Rumpelstiltskin holds court in a palace of candles and mirrors with a goose at his side.
The returning cast are given one good variation each. Cameron Diaz’s Fiona is now the leader of an ogre resistance who has never met Shrek and has no intention of being rescued, and Diaz plays her harder and better for it. Eddie Murphy’s Donkey is pulling a witch’s wagon and has no idea who this ogre is, which lets Murphy be frightened of Shrek again, and he is still the quickest voice in the film. Antonio Banderas’s Puss in Boots has become a pampered house cat the size of a cushion, and the sight of him trying to leap and failing got the loudest laugh out of us in the whole 93 minutes.
The problem is that we have been here before, and the film knows it. An ogre who wants to be feared learns that he would rather be loved; a princess who does not need him comes round. That was Shrek (2001), and it was fresher then because the fairy-tale jokes were new and nobody had drawn the swamp before. Here the pop-culture needling has mostly gone, which is a mercy, but nothing much replaces it except a shape borrowed from It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) and a clock running down. The Pied Piper sequence, in which an army of ogres is made to boogie against its will, is the only set piece we would show to someone who had not seen the film.
Harry Gregson-Williams brings back the series’ old themes and plays them slower and sadder in the altered world, which does a good deal of the emotional work the script is too busy for. And the last stretch, which we will not describe, got us a little. Mike Myers and Diaz play the final scenes straight, with no gag to hide behind, and after four films and a great deal of noise the quiet landed harder than it had any right to. We were slightly embarrassed to be moved. We were moved all the same.
It carries a U certificate and it runs 93 minutes, and it does the thing a fourth film is for, which is to stop with some dignity. Children who like the ogre will like it. Adults who were tired of him by the third will find the tiredness has been written into the script and turned, just about, into a subject. Watch it at home with the children, and stay awake for the opening twenty minutes even if you plan to doze through the middle.
Most critics agree the fourth Shrek is a step up from the third, with more heart than its immediate predecessor, though few are moved beyond mild approval. The praise clusters on the premise, an alternate world borrowed from It’s a Wonderful Life, and on two supporting turns: Rumpelstiltskin as a lively villain and Antonio Banderas’s Puss in Boots. Several reviews also like the renewed emotional business between Shrek and Fiona and call it a decent place to stop.
The reservations are about freshness. A clear minority find it tired and lazy, recycling the first film’s story without taking its characters anywhere; The AV Club says it wastes the chance to look properly at Fiona and the costs of parenthood, and Variety calls the animation dated. The 3D divides the reviews almost evenly. The spread is wide, and the warmer notices come mostly from the British press, with Empire and HeyUGuys at the top.
The critic finds the fourth film a satisfying return to form and says the franchise is going out on a high. He praises its focus on character and the renewed emotional arc between Shrek and Fiona.
Read the full review →Sharkey finds the film a welcome return to form, with more heart and cleverness than its predecessor. She especially praises the emotional depth and the animation’s successful partnership with 3-D.
Read the full review →Bradshaw finds it an enjoyable, good-natured family comedy and a pleasing end to the series, while hoping it really is the last installment. He praises its relaxed feel and entertaining villain, Rumpelstiltskin, but notes that the franchise has lost the original film’s subversion and impact.
Read the full review →The review’s verdict is not available in the accessible page text. No praise or complaint can be identified because the article is behind a paywall.
Read the full review →The review finds the fourth Shrek film dull in its domestic setup but more engaging once its darker alternate world emerges. It praises the cleverly conceived, dystopian take on It's a Wonderful Life.
Read the full review →The available page information does not reveal Smith’s verdict. The standfirst singles out the film’s sci-fi parallel-universe premise.
Read the full review →Part of · 4 of 4
Puss in Boots: The Last Wish · not reviewed yetThe cat gets his own film and, unexpectedly, the series’ best one.
It's a Wonderful LifeThe original never-existed story, and the one this film is quietly tracing.
Groundhog DayA man lives the same day until he deserves a different one.
The Princess BrideFairy-tale mockery that loves what it mocks, and still the model.
WolfwalkersIrish hand-drawn animation about a hunted people, with a real sense of place.
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