Media Macaroni

We enjoy Shrek in this house. Well, maybe not Shrek the Third so much as the first two. So, the girl and I headed out for a show of Shrek Forever After. I searched to find a theater that was NOT showing it in 3D, to no avail. My choices appeared to be 3D and IMAX. I promised the girl so we went anyway. As we nestled into the theater, my wallet was $37 lighter. One adult. One child. One small popcorn. THIRTY. SEVEN. DOLLARS.

I started getting cranky, watching all of the trailers for the movies I’ll soon be shelling out 37 more dollars for (Megamind does look awesome, though). Most of the movies looked like the 3D would be a distraction not an addition (like How to Train Your Dragon), and I was sure that the Shrek we were about to see would be the same. I was not in a good place to like this movie.

And yet. Right off the bat, the animation drew me in, certainly the best of all of the Shreks. The textures were amazing, particularly on Shrek and Donkey, and their facial expressions have become so much more complex. And yes, though I’m reluctant to admit it, from the moment a horse-drawn carriage rides out over the audience, I was taken with the 3D.

Also, the writing was good. The movie is an unoriginal story lifted directly from It’s a Wonderful Life, but I often found myself and Olive laughing out loud, with lines I’ll enjoy repeating out of context: “My donkey fell down your waffle hole” and “Wolfy, bring my my angry wig!” There was also good gag use of music to amuse the parents, particularly The Beastie Boys’ Sure Shot, and some of my TV favs provided new voices, including Jon Hamm and Jane Lynch.

We had a good time. Now the key question as I write this is was it 37-dollars-worth of a good time? If I had plunked down a twenty, I’d recommend it without reservations. If you’re going with more than two people, though, you’ll cross the fifty dollar mark. For a movie. Somehow, that seems unimaginable to me. But I love going to the movies, and I love sharing that with Olive. In that regard, $37 is a small price to pay for an entertaining afternoon with my charming first born. Maybe I’ll stop being crabby now.

If you’ll allow me a Shrek tangent, Olive recently got an amazing gift. It’s The One and Only Shrek!, a compilation of six William Steig stories. The book has taken over bedtime, as Olive asks to cycle through the stories. It includes classics like Brave Irene and Doctor De Soto, and yes, Shrek. As my husband rightly pointed out after reading through the original story a few times is that it would make a great movie. We want to see that movie: the grouchy ogre who eats lightning bolts and can shoot lasers from his eyes. That would be awesome.

This entry was posted on Saturday, May 29th, 2010 at 8:44 pm and is filed under Movies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.