Why Shrek is an Enduring Classic

funding for shaperless is provided by squarespace the sponsor of today's video from websites and online stores to marketing tools and analytics squarespace is the all-in-one platform to build a beautiful online presence and run your business previously on shaffrillas productions mrs obama i've done it i've talked about the entire shrek franchise not if i have anything to say about it and i do oh yeah you still haven't done it if you don't make the shrek video something terrible will happen uh-oh yeah i'd better get on that hey everyone i made videos about the second and third installments in the shrek trilogy plus this one terrible fanfic all that was left was the original shrek movie but i procrastinated like hell on that because i genuinely had no idea what was left to be said seriously what is left to be said everyone in the history of existence has given their take on shrek i've done it twice in brief countdown segments i don't have a particularly strong take on this movie like i do with all the other ones it's just shrek i think it's pretty great and that's about it with that said i do indeed need to complete the saga so i might as well just talk about why i find this movie so friggin neat this prequel to my other shrek analyses is gonna be comparatively more laid back and not quite as emotionally charged but after the year we've all had i think it'll be a nice little capper alright so before we jump in a very quick history lesson about shrek and dreamworks that most people probably already know but it's important for context nonetheless blah blah blah dreamworks was founded because jeffrey katzenberg who helped usher in the disney renaissance by working on iconic films like beauty and the beast and the little mermaid and more recently created the insanely iconic and long-lasting entertainment platform quibby bitterly left disney when he was passed up for a promotion so he steven spielberg and david geffen founded dreamworks mainly out of revenge towards disney shrek is generally seen as a revenge piece where then ceo of disney michael eisner is portrayed as the diminutive oh floored quad oh excuse me farquad and in general the story parodies and subverts a ton of typical disney tropes however this movie and by extension the entire shrek franchise is much more than a simple parody it's its own unique intriguing thematically rich story independent of the parody angle you can easily watch shrek and still enjoy it without any prior knowledge of disney it still holds up and i think the reason for that is because the story and characters and worlds aren't exclusively meant to parody disney like how a lot of terrible parody movies exist solely to be terrible parody movies shrek had a lot of thought put into the characters their dynamics their arcs and the overall tone the movie was going for through its storytelling and world as a result i think shrek is a solid example of a parody but it shines even brighter as its own unique story that takes the foundation of what it's parodying and makes something new and surprisingly heartfelt out of it so let's just get into it buckle up friendos here's what i like about shrek [Music] as i've alluded before one of the most notable attributes of shrek is its laid-back style of humor whereas the rest of the franchise sees fit to constantly throw jokes in your face either successfully or unsuccessfully this shrek is comparatively a lot less aggressive in its humor style a lot of the humor in this movie simply comes from the line deliveries of these really well cast actors like everyone here embodies their character so perfectly which contributes to such great exchanges any conversation between mike myers and eddie murphy in this movie is absolute gold they give shrek and donkey such natural chemistry and charisma that it cracks me up anytime they interact about anything really from onions and layers to shrek's farts to donkey making waffles there's just something so solid about the delivery here i mean the line why are you following me isn't funny on paper but then you hear mike myers say why are you following me and it's just inexplicably hilarious there's a reason so many seemingly mundane lines of dialogue from this movie have been immortalized in meme history rather famously chris farley was initially cast as shrek but sadly passed away before he could finish recording his dialogue so they brought in mike myers who recorded it all then had an epiphany later on and asked to re-record all his dialogue with a scottish accent katzenberg claimed they've redid 4 million dollars worth of animation to incorporate the accent which mike myers has disputed but regardless the willingness to redo the vast majority of the film to accommodate this perfect new accent myers had concocted for the character shows how shrek was definitely a labor of love from those involved steven spielberg sent meyers a letter thanking him for caring so much about the character noting that the scottish accent improved the movie and yeah i'm sure it did it's impossible to picture shrek without this distinct unforgettable accent it's a large part of what makes this movie so effortlessly funny plus hot take this is the only shrek movie where it sounds like cameron diaz is actually trying her voice is so expressive and spunky and hysterical here and then never again to be honest shrek forever after is a distant second place in this regard but i think that's just because of how well she's written there but then there's lord farquaad brought to life by the impeccable john go on i know i left him off my dreamworks villain list since fairy godmother and rumpelstiltskin are better antagonists but lord farquaad might be one of the most iconic if one of the less intimidating and effective he's not the best at being an active threat but he serves his role in the story well and of course he's funny as [ __ ] like hysterically so and again i think his unforgettable voice plays a big role in this aside from great delivery on some of the more seemingly mundane lines there's also a ton of great jokes every time it sings a song that's going in one direction only to suddenly shift with the next line like [Music] those are always fun i like how this movie is allowed to swear and not just tease a swear like modern day kitty fight dreamworks the magic mirror stuff and other assorted fairy tale character stuff is really fun donkey getting with dragon is the most baffling yet incredible feat i've ever witnessed in my life and so on and so forth some stuff doesn't quite land like every god damn joke about farquaad being short short supply there are those who think little of him but i'll let you do that measuring when you see him tomorrow did i get it it was a funny reveal at first and it was funny when this table was too high but that's it you don't need to keep making jokes about it bro otherwise yeah the humor really works whether it's parodying disney or just doing its own thing shrek is a really down to earth funny movie but in addition to being hilarious shrek absolutely killed it in the soundtrack department shrek 1 has such an amazing soundtrack while it isn't quite as iconic as shrek 2's it contributes a ton to the atmosphere and overall tone in this movie and its world this is intended to be the anti-disney movie where disney would open their movie with a musical number being sung by the characters dreamworks opens with somebody and i think that's stunning keep in mind this movie came out right after the disney renaissance which popularized the whole animated movie musical format and dreamworks looked like it was gonna follow this same format at first glance the prince of egypt came out in 98 and that was a big animated movie musical the road to el dorado came out in 2000 and that had a big animated musical number plus other songs that elton john sang in the background the big question here was whether or not shrek would follow in the footsteps of these movies and continue the musical trend or completely subvert the concept entirely and it goes hard into subverting that concept the movie opens with this gorgeous piano song that ended up becoming ubiquitous with dreamworks as a studio not just shrek then we have this nice fairy tale reading right after it looks like a true traditional beautiful fairy tale experience then shrek uses a page from a fairy tale book to wipe his ass and opens the door to treat us to that sweet somebody absolutely iconic come on i can't think of a better way to establish exactly what this film is going to be than this all-star sequence it's genuinely one of the most effective openings in film history and from there the film continues on with early 2000's hit after early 2000's hit bad reputation i'm on my way my beloved monster and me there's really not a bad track in the bunch they all fit the tones of their scenes so well and contribute to such iconic sequences furthermore any attempt at a traditional musical theater song is shut down entirely donkey's about to sing a cute little ballad about friendship and shronk shuts him down robin hood and his merry men are going to lay down the law in song and explain what they're all about and fiona whacks them hell before that fiona sings this seemingly beautiful melody to some burrs and it causes them to explode like what the [ __ ] this movie just keeps the attacks on traditional musical numbers coming and while it doesn't seem like anything particularly special now it was probably extremely cathartic for 2001 audiences who had just gotten out of the disney renaissance and were a little bit tired of constant musical numbers can't relate but hey i still really like the satire strike is going for here shrek as a film is fundamentally opposed to the very concept of musical theater since it's trying to be everything disney isn't but they're not just cutting traditional musical theater songs and calling it a day they're replacing those traditional musical theater songs with pop music in order to give the movie a very distinct tone the pop music is so integral to shrek's identity as a story and as a parody that taking this pop music out and replacing it with regular musical theater songs completely misses the points of the entire film shrek is not shrek without somebody if shrek is musical theater songs and not pop music the parody angle becomes shallow the tone becomes muddled and the main conceit of shrek's character is kinda ruined the idea is that he doesn't open up to anyone about his feelings and if he were in a musical he would be forced to through song that would really muddle his character arc of learning to open up more to donkey and fiona but then again what am i talking about this is all a hypothetical shrek is never gonna be a musical because good lord that would be the stupidest idea ever and if that existed i definitely would never want to talk about it because it would make me unreasonably upset and angry so let's move on no shrek musical we already get enough emotion from the hallelujah sequence which is the scene in every shrek movie where there's a super sad song because shrek is alone and about to lose all the good things in his life the original version of this recurrence is still the best one like sometimes you don't need a musical number to convey strong emotion you can do it through simple somber motions and faces from the characters as a really strong emotionally powerful cover plays like it really gives me feelings more so than any song about shrek building a wall between him and the outside world ever could just as a random non-specific example and the movie obviously comes in clutch with i'm a believer at the very end talk about an unintentionally perfect marriage of story and song if i didn't know any better i'd swear this song was written for the movie that's how perfectly it fits the story and characters i thought love was only true in fairy tales come on but speaking of those characters i want to talk about one of them in particular the unspoken hero of this film whose contributions to its excellent narrative always seem to go overlooked a name you all know it starts with a d that's right it's doris voiced by larry k oh wait doris came from shrek 2. okay i i guess i'll talk about donkey instead [Music] out of all the shrek movies shrek 1 easily uses donkey the best like it's not even a contest at first glance it seems like donkey is a fun but unnecessary animal sidekick just a traveling companion that can tell funny jokes and banter with shrek as the story goes along but he's honestly way more integral to this movie's story and themes than most people give him credit for if one were to summarize the plot of shrek in a single sentence they probably say something along the lines of an ogre falls in love with a princess and they live happily ever after as ogres you know really emphasize the love story that lies at the heart of the film but i don't think that's the whole story i would summarize shrek with this sentence a mean ogre learns to open up to others and discovers the value of love and friendship because shrek isn't just a story about love it's about friendship fiona isn't the first person shrek opens up to donkey is he's an integral confidant for shrek to relay his true feelings to shrek has never been able to do that before because everyone he's ever come across has been terrified of him he claims that he enjoys his life of solitude as this monster everyone fears but deep down inside he's profusely lonely and now all of a sudden there's this little talking donkey who isn't scared of him shrek is genuinely taken aback by the fact that donkey isn't taken aback which really says a lot about how much shrek has internalized what society thinks of him he thinks he's a monster because everyone else thinks he's a monster so it must be true donkey is the first person in shrek's life to challenge this conception which sets the stage for shrek's journey of realizing that he is worthy of love after spending a decent amount of time with donkey shrek starts to let some of his walls down and acknowledge that he's not quite the same monster society sees him as when donkey asked shrek why don't you just pull some of that ogre stuff on him you know throttling lay seized his fortress shrek mocks that idea and goes on to tell donkey that ogres have layers and i love this scene because it's kind of a parody of morals and symbolism and all that junk shrek is trying to impart a valuable lesson to donkey through the use of something nearby as a metaphor it's a lot like that scene in kung fu panda where oogway and shifu are talking about poe and using peaches their seeds and their trees as a metaphor that's a pretty well written scene but i like the shrek take on the concept even more how it subverts the norm for one of these scenes since shrek is bad at explaining and developing the sort of metaphor and donkey is way too dense to get the points to be fair though everything donkey said to compare ogres and onions was completely spot on so can't fault him there but this is what i love about donkey he's such a perfect foil to shrek not just because he's a huge extrovert who never stops talking but because he's so innocent and genuine in this movie later shrek movies play up his talkativeness way more than his innocence and we didn't really get a return to the more genuine donkey until shrek forever after but in this movie he's like a lost little kid who just happens to swear sometimes shrek doesn't want to take this sweet summer child in but no one else knows where farquaad lives so they're stuck together through a matter of circumstance and i love the bond between this curmudgeonly old ogre and this naive friendly noble steed however it isn't until the scene with the big moon where donkey's role in the plot starts to pay dividends drake and shronky have just rescued fiora and they're lying out under the stars while fiona's in her tomb these two boys are kind of bonding looking at constellations and all that it's nice until donkey mentions heading back to r swamp and shrek firmly states that there is no r just him and his swamp this leads to an argument where donkey just keeps pushing and trying to get to the heart of shrek's problems again though he acts very naive and innocent throughout it all he genuinely wants to help his new friend open up about why he always pushes people away and eventually shrek has no choice but to let it all out who are you trying to keep out just tell me that [ __ ] who everyone okay shrek finally admits that he's upset with the way people judge him before they even know him and he's upset that he has to live alone as a result and what does donkey do remind shrek that he didn't run in fear or think shrek was a monster when they first met it's a really beautiful moment and it's crucial plot-wise since fiona overhears this and starts reconsidering her attitude towards shrek she never would have seen shrek's hidden layers if it wasn't for donkey bringing them out and donkey turns out to not just be a crucial confidant for shrek but also fiona he discovers fiona's ogre curse later on and helps console her giving her the idea that maybe she'd be better off with shrek instead of farquaad he even promises not to tell shrek and keeps that promise despite being a huge motor mouth what a lad donkey's conversation with fiona is also important plot-wise even though i don't love the direction this scene leads the plot in the force misunderstanding plot is a little contrived and really my only major issue with the film at least it leads to the hallelujah sequence overall donkey is just integral to shrek the movie's plot and shrek the character's character arc in a way he never is in any of the subsequent films shrek didn't just find meaning in his love for fiona but also his friendship with donkey he felt betrayed by both of them not just fiona they gave his reconciliation with donkey all the time it needed because it's such an integral cornerstone of the film he's so much more than a simple comedic sidekick he's kind of the heart of the movie and they did him so right here you know who else they did so right fiora i've said before that fiona is at her most interesting and shrek forever after but this movie is a pretty close second she has this fire and spunk to her that the later shred movies never quite recaptured and i think that helps make her blooming romance with shriek a lot more believable i love the way she's introduced wanting to make her moment of rescue as perfect as possible puckering her lips and preparing for a kiss only to get shook awake and desperately trying to keep any semblance of romance going even though shrek is having none of it she lets cracks of her spunky self show during the rescue sequence and then once shrimp is revealed to be an ogre all of her prim and proper attributes melt away and she lets her frustrations out much like how donkey is the first person to ever try and befriend shrek fiona is the only person to actively stand up to him without failing miserably that is she counters his sassy remarks with even more sass she screams at him to find some place to set up camp for the night and it actually works shrek comes to admire her authority her surprise crass tendencies and her even surprising her combat capabilities against robin hood and his merry men shrek grows to respect her and that respect leads to attraction fiona meanwhile is initially taken aback by her fabled prince charming turning out to be an ogre and she's incredibly unhappy at first but after overhearing drek and shronky talking on that big ass moon night she comes to realize that perhaps she treated shrek too harshly after all she's ashamed of her ogrehood during the night hours she wants so desperately to get rid of this ogre curse and feel good about her appearance but as donkey said shrek's ugly 24 7. and unlike fiona who hasn't interacted with people in a while shrek constantly has to deal with society shunning him for his outward appearance something fiona has avoided throughout most of her life she never considered the idea that shrek was the living embodiment of her fears of rejection by society this in turn prompts her to treat him with kindness and receive kindness in return and while she initially can't break free of her desire to conform to society by breaking the curse and living life as a human she eventually realizes that she'll be unhappy with farquaad and more happy as her true authentic self which as it turns out is an ogre it doesn't matter that society will perceive her as ugly all that matters is that she's comfortable in her own skin in the end it turns out that fiona's curse wasn't her ogre transformation her curse was society by finally realizing that she doesn't care what society thinks of her her curse is broken her life used to be a tragedy but now she realizes it's shrek 2001 but for realsies that's what i love about this movie's conclusion it's a similar transformation moment to beauty and the beast but an inversion rather than become quote unquote beautiful fiona remains an ogre and this is treated as the happy ending it absolutely deserves to be and that gorgeous angelic score damn i love this movie so yeah shrek 1 is a pretty great film it makes excellent use of both fiona and donkey and while it has the weakest character arc in the trilogy for shrek himself it's still a really good journey of self-discovery for our ogre boy as he navigates love and friendship for the first time it's an endlessly rewatchable movie that while not quite as good as its two sequels is an absolute delight regardless however i feel like i'd be doing y'all a disservice if i didn't address the other side of this movie not the movie itself but what it did to dreamworks and the rest of the animation industry i feel like this is the main reason a lot of people loathe shrek not so much because they don't like the film itself even though it's totally valid to do so and a lot of people do but because of the turning point it's signified in the industry a tragedy indeed let's talk about that [Music] now shrek's influence in the realm of animation was immense not only was the movie a smash hit at the box office but it received the first ever academy award for best animated feature and a nomination for the academy award for best adapted screenplay which like i love this movie but i don't think it's that great shrek 2 on the other hand regardless shrek's success marked a turning point in the industry where animated movies became highly dependent on three things star power crude humor and excessive pop culture references it became the entire bread and butter for studios like blue sky sony pictures animation and everyone's favorite animation company illumination yeah shrek also sparked a trend of fairy tale spoof movies a few of which are great most of which were terrible hell you can even smell shrek's oniony influence on disney during the 2000s look no further than chicken little a crude pop culture reference written [ __ ] terrible fairy tale spoof that i should probably talk about sometime but i feel like the studio that honestly suffered the most from shrek's influence was dreamworks itself after shrek's runaway success it quickly became the template for the entire studio's output shrek came out in 2001 and was then followed up by spirit and sinbad two 2d animated movies that really didn't do well financially or even critically it was pretty clear that 2d was on the way out in the industry considering disney was experiencing the same problem with their 2d animated movies but hey 2d animation going away was one thing dreamworks clearly had to convert entirely to 3d animation but they could have kept the same tone as their 2d animated movies going forward make them adventurous journeys with original songs and emotional storylines dreamworks was working on two movies for 2004 an obviously warranted sequel to shrek and a new original 3d animated film basically they had to choose stick with the tried and true storytelling method that was more in line with classic disney or kick it up a notch and expand on shrek's attributes when crafting their next non-shrek 3d animated film and they decided to kick it say hello to my old friend sharktail the movie that tried to copy shrek's formula while fundamentally misunderstanding its appeal sharktail was crude and celebrity infested and pop culture reference ridden to the max showing how dreamworks completely forgot why shrek worked as well as it did it didn't have these three elements because they make for a winning formula for animated movies it had them because they made for a winning parody of disney shrek works because it acts crude on the outside despite having a really strong emotional center you'd never expect just like the main character shrek tells a beautiful love story for characters who have been denied beauty or love in classic fairy tales many of which came from disney this is the fundamental core appeal of shrek so when you rip that core out and plug it into a terrible mob movie about talking fish of course it doesn't work the crude humor has no underlying purpose anymore it's just there to be crude everything sharktail wants to say is vapid and meaningless and that's because it leans too heavily into the shrek mold and this shrek mold is honestly what's holding dreamworks back as a studio the crude humor is generally seen as their defining trait and that sucks because i think their defining trait should be their amazing approach to sequels or their recurring and nuanced use of imposter syndrome or their dynamic exciting animation style when it comes to fight scenes or flight scenes but to be fair those attributes don't apply to every one of their movies crude humor mostly does and it's my biggest problem with the best dreamworks movies kung fu panda and how to train your dragon are both excellent trilogies but some of the jokes they tell just don't land that well a lot still do obviously mostly in the former trilogies case but for the most part this shrek mold residue really does these excellent stories a disservice and it drags their lesser movies down even further you're telling me monsters vs aliens has crude humor i like it even less now you're telling me trolls has crude humor yeah i sure hope it does not it does not that would be nice if it does not you're telling me the croods has inappropriate humor i i wish there was a shorter word i could use instead of inappropriate to describe the crew's humor but oh well i don't really like that it works for shrek because it signifies how ogres deviate from societal norms and how this movie's world deviates from disney norms but it didn't need to keep on existing like it did and it did not need to become the template for american animated films as a whole like good lord so yeah it's easy to sort of point the blame finger at shrek and claim that it set animated films back but i don't think that's fair it's not shrek's fault it was successful and certainly not its fault that animation studios dreamworks included misunderstood why it was successful it's just a really strong movie and i think it's completely worth existing despite all the tonal knockoffs it received over the years maybe the reason it was so frequently imitated is because it's really good not only a pop culture phenomenon but a movie that can still be watched enjoyed and obsessed over nearly 20 years later it's so easy to understand exactly what makes it such an enduring classic and why it just refuses to stop being relevant long after its franchise ended you know for now it's a truly wonderful movie you know it you love it it's shrek i will never get tired of re-watching it and with that the entire retrospective is complete i mean the movies and the two main holiday specials are i've got some smaller fish to fry but nothing too major there certainly wasn't any other significant piece of shrek media that i've been avoiding talking about all these years none whatsoever hi past james here while i'm currently having a mental breakdown on account of shark the musical i planned for this eventuality and pre-recorded a sponsorship segment about squarespace please enjoy the following discussion about squarespace squarespace is a fantastic intuitive online website builder that allows you to create beautiful websites for your business or personal hobby present your work using squarespace's professional portfolio designs display projects and customizable galleries and add password protected pages to share private work with clients you can even present your videos from youtube vimeo and animoto on your squarespace site add an image overlay to your video to improve your website's load speed by waiting to embed video players until playback starts every design 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Channel: Schaffrillas Productions

Views: 1,333,873

Rating: 4.9723659 out of 5

Keywords: Schaffrillas Productions, Shrek, Donkey, Fiona, Farquaad, DreamWorks

Id: GNgsgRBLRGI

Length: 28min 21sec (1701 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 16 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/[deleted]]

"Shrek isn't Shrek without SOMEBODY"

[u/TheGameMaster115]

:)

[u/fgasctq]

Insert phase 2 vordt of the boreal valley theme

[u/KrishaCZ]

praise shroncc

[u/bionicjoey]

I look forward to the madness Schaff will inevitably fall into as he tries to make a video on the Shrek musical.