Shrek 2

I'll admit, I did giggle in many places in this film, and I particularly liked the references to Tom Waits and the TV footage of the arrest of Shrek and his conspirators, but I just can't muster up the enthusiasm to heartily recommend the film to anyone, even small children. It's not that the animation is worse, or that the plot isn't as interesting, because there's nothing really wrong there. But I left the theater with two feelings. One: that I already couldn't remember any of the jokes (because they sped by? because there were too many right on top of each other?). Two: that all the things the main characters are able to pull off after they take the "Happily Ever After" potion and change into handsome men and women defeats the moral of the story -- that those things don't really matter. Sure, brand me as overly cynical, but if they're going to portray the land of Far Far Away as a Hollywood-esque land of fancy strip malls then there should be commentary on what's so fake and distasteful about it. And it wasn't there. Maybe clauses in the filmmakers' contracts prevent them from attacking Hollywood in words... Regardless, there are funny bits and Antonio Banderas as Puss in Boots steals the show, in my opinion, but it won't do any harm to wait to see it at the second-run theater.

year: 2004
length: 93 min.
rating: 3.0
IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0298148/combined