Review: SHREK FOREVER AFTER

The four-quel.  The quadrilogy.  The final chapter in the epic, SHREK saga that has spanned nine years and has garnered billions of dollars for DreamWorks.  If you’re going to build your latest film as the last of the series (we’ll get into why this act was pointless in a bit), you had better have a nice send-off, a conclusion that give some sense of finality.  And, if you’re making a SHREK film, whether that film is the first, second, third, or last, you had better have a nice mixture of comedy and adventure.  SHREK FOREVER AFTER lands on only one side of this figurative coin, but it lands on that side awfully hard.

When we last left Shrek (voiced by Mike Myers), he and Fiona (voiced by Cameron Diaz) had just had triplets and all was grand in the land.  But, if Hollywood sequels tell us anything, nothing is “happily ever after…”  Those three, little dots after that saying are long years of typical, family strife and the nearly unbearable tedium that comes with normalcy.  This is something Shrek is tired of, and years after thinking his life is perfect, he begins having what all ogres at his age have (or, at least I hear), a mid-life crisis.

After a particularly gruesome, first birthday party for his children, Shrek runs away from his family, seeking some sense of who he was before Donkey (voiced by Eddie Murphy), Fiona, and the life he has come to lead fell into his lap.  Enter Rumpelstiltskin, a wish-granter, who makes Shrek a deal.  Give a day, get a day.  In essence, Shrek will be able to lead the life he once had for one day, but he has to give a day in return.  Needless to say, and, because Rumpelstiltskin is such an evil, little guy, things go hairy, and Shrek ends up in a world where, IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE style, he never existed.

SHREK FOREVER AFTER is a better film than SHREK THE THIRD, and, when you look at the team behind that third entry (it’s co-directors and twelve, yes, 12! screenwriters), it’s a wonder any, cohesive film came out of it at all.  Some would even say that film ended up being a huge mess, and, thankfully, the team behind SHREK FOREVER AFTER is new to the table.  This fourth film is filled with a nice sense of adventure.  The years the animators behind this series have had working on it pay off.  The beautiful animation is old-hat for them, and all that is left to worry about is the story, the tone, and the characters.

The tone is certainly there.  While it will never rival the first film in terms of comedic value, and most definitely comes nowhere near the hilarity of SHREK 2, SHREK FOREVER AFTER is a film that never ceases to make you laugh.  The story they have put before themselves gives the screenwriters plenty of opportunity to alter the most beloved character so that Fiona is a warrior ogre leading a revolution against the ruling Rumpelstiltskin, the Gingerbread Man has become a gladiator-style fighter who take out animal crackers like it’s nothing, and Donkey has been turned into essentially a car radio for a group of witches.  Ever wonder what happened to Puss in Boots (voiced by Antonio Banderas)?  Let’s just say he’s let himself go.  The opportunities have been seized for the characters, but, aside from the world-turned-on-its-ear gimmick, there is enough self-referential material and slightly adult humor to entertain you all.

Where SHREK FOREVER AFTER fails, and it fails mightily, is in the department of placement and this idea that it is the final film of the series.  There is really no need for it.  Don’t expect some big revelations that change your outlook on the franchise, and don’t expect the world to end, either.  When all is said and done, this is just another film in a series of four films that could just as easily tag on a fifth, sixth, or even seventh film if the DreamWorks Animation so chooses.

To that end, and despite the sense of adventure the film has in droves, there is really nothing special about SHREK FOREVER AFTER.  Sure, it has that gimmick going for its comedy, and the thought of a fat Puss in Boots looking nonchalantly at a mouse who is stealing his milk is sure to be remembered.  But the feeling that you got from SHREK and most certainly SHREK 2 that you are watching something other than just, another film is completely gone.  The feeling you get is more along the lines of an expanded, TV special.  It garners a Summer release only because Shrek is such a staple to DreamWorks Animation, and the thought of releasing an entry of this franchise anywhere but in the middle of May would be ludicrous.  Fine.  But, if you’re going back to the drawing board after SHREK THE THIRD to deliver a film that pulls back in all the people who walked away from the franchise after that debacle, you had better have something special to deliver.  SHREK FOREVER AFTER just isn’t it.

As with the animators behind the characters, the voices have become something along the lines of old-hat, as well, and there is very little to be said for the main cast here.  What can be analyzed is the idea behind the casting of some ancillary characters.  The world of animated film has become ensconced with half-baked premises, clunky animation, and a huge list of A-level talent behind the voices.  Not so much with SHREK FOREVER AFTER.  In fact, the most inspired choice in voice for the film is in Rumpelstiltskin.  Walt Dohrn isn’t, exactly, a household name.  He’s done more writing work than voice work, but the voice he puts behind this film’s antagonist is brilliant, both quirky and malevolent but with a playfulness we probably wouldn’t have gotten from a name.  He gives the Rumpelstiltskin character a life it may not have had otherwise.

There’s nothing magical about SHREK FOREVER AFTER.  There’s nothing breathtaking.  In years to come, if this does prove to be the final film in the franchise, it won’t be remembered as fondly as the first, two films.  It will, however, be remembered as a minor bounce-back from the travesty that was SHREK THE THIRD, not precisely what the crew behind this film were going for, I’m sure.  But, if they wanted SHREK FOREVER AFTER to be remembered, the same level of care they put into the comedy and the adventure of the piece would have been copied over to making it something special.  As it is, it’s just another SHREK movie, and, funny or not, you can’t help but get the sense that, much like the movie’s protagonist, we will soon be in a world where it doesn’t feel like SHREK FOREVER AFTER ever even existed.

Overall Rating: 3 out of 5 stars