Shrek 2 4K 2004 Ultra HD 2160p

The sequel begins with an unexpected plot twist: Shrek and Fiona return from their honeymoon and find a letter from the princess' parents inviting them to dinner. Mom and Dad are in for a wonderful surprise (the daughter has turned into a troll)! Together with the Donkey, the happy couple of newlyweds set off on a journey and, as always, get into a whirlwind of events. It's time to get to know their new friends better!

Shrek 2 4K Review
Shrek and his faithful squire, Donkey, were invented by William Steig. At the time of the book's release the author was over 80 years old, a good time to reconsider the years he had lived through. And there was much to remember! Staig announced himself in the '30s as the author of comics about "Babies": his heroes were bullies, children of the streets. Later he preferred to draw animals dressed as people. But these sketches were addressed to adults. It wasn't until the end of his career that Steig began to write fairy tales for children... On which, by the way, more than one generation of Americans grew up. "Roland the Musician", "Amos and Boris", "Isle of Abel", "The Unusual Bone" - each of these tales was characterized by an unconventional approach to the characters and their adventures: the troubles just fell on the fragile shoulders of mice, piglets and whales. At the time of writing "Shrek," William Steig had already become "the most important" among illustrators. To think that at one time he not only knew Picasso, but also managed to quarrel with him!

So in 1990, Staig created the image of the "Don Quixote" of our time, which, in addition to being green, was born to be an ogre. Instead of Sancho Panza, he got a talking donkey, but the trick, as Shrek noticed, is not in the donkey talking, but in HOW to make him shut up! By the way, Steig didn't take the name of his hero from the ceiling. The prototype was the mysterious Max Schreck, who played Nosferato in Friedrich Murnau's expressionistic horror of the same name. So Staig's exertions of cinematic history began directly in the book. Not surprisingly, the baton was picked up by Geoffrey Katzenberg's team, which exactly five years after the release of the tale began to prepare the script for the wide screen. And the story began to play with new colors. The colors of modern pop culture.

"Get the dead girl off the table!" - yells Shrek when the seven dwarves dragging Snow White get rid of their burden right in front of his plate. But too late... The Grey Wolf is already lying in his bed, and the displaced persons have set up camp in the courtyard. What madness is going on in the familiar swamp? Lord Fourquaad has decided to throw all the fairy tale heroes out of the kingdom. The three bears are sitting in a cage, someone got twenty coins for the witch, next in line are the three little pigs, the wolf and the seven little goats. Papa Carlo sells Pinocchio for pennies, calling him a possessed toy. Cinderella is relegated to the category of "hot" brides-to-be sold by the talking Magic Mirror. The moral of Furquaad is, "Fairy tales have fallen in value a lot these days, and not many people need them." But that's in the cartoon...

In real life, however, Katzenberg really had a go at the head of the Disney studios, for it was the latter that served as the prototype of the haughty lord. Apparently, therefore, before the first "Shrek" movie producer gathered a panel of lawyers to confer and reached their verdict: whether DreamWorks faces trial for mischief or the company gets off lightly? It didn't... And it made money, too. About half a billion dollars went into the ogre's piggy bank. A good workout before the real race, for the second part of the adventures of Shrek, his "shrekini" and relentless gray friend only the first weekend brought together 108 million dollars - a record for modern animation. The final number of collections of the second part compared to the first has doubled - almost a billion U.S. dollars. Not in vain guys agonized for so many years! After all, it only seems that computer technology simplifies the process of creating animation. And meanwhile, over each character is working on 20-25 people! And they are just "developing" appearance, but also create muscles of their characters. For example, the face of Shrek contains 218 muscles.

As for the "movie stuff," then there scriptwriters parody epic "Scary Movie" nervously smoking on the sidelines. "Shrek" gives them the upper hand. In the cartoonist's personal citation book, there are hits from the 1930s as well as more recent ones... Besides the hyped "Spider-Men," "The Matrix," "The Masks of Zorro," "X-Men," "Lord of the Rings" or "Impossible Missions," there are subtle allusions to "The Wizard of Oz" /Wizard Of Oz, The (1939) with Judy Garland, The Cabaret (1972) with Liza Minnelli, Cat Ballou (1965) with Jane Fonda, The Seventh Year Itch, The (1955) with Marilyn Monroe and many other films. But even this witty screenwriters seemed not enough, it was necessary to add fire. So they put up a Botticelli Venus on the palace walls, portraits of sitting monarchs (hello to Elizabeth II) and posters of pop stars like Justin Timberlake. The voice of the latter, by the way, in "Shrek the Third" /Shrek the Third/ (2007) was given to a rebellious hippie Arthur.

And at the voicing of "Shrek" the company gathered all stars: Mike Myers (Shrek), Cameron Diaz (Fiona), Eddie Murphy (Donkey), Antonio Banderas (Cat), Julie Andrews (Queen), Rupert Everett (Prince). Each of them is so much in tune with his character that one can only wonder if the animators copied the looks and plastique of the characters from them. You could have sworn that Donkey smiles a typical Murphy white-toothed smile, and Fiona has kung-fu moves just like Diaz in Charlie's Angels. In Prince, you can see the purely English arrogance inherent in Everett in life and on the screen. By the way, during the entire voicing of the cartoon actors never met in the studio.

But not without jokes. For example, Mike Myers finished Shrek's last line: "Attention all fairy tale creatures!", literally on the fly, in a limousine Katzenberg, who flew to New York especially for this. Shrek's accent, Myers claimed, the actor borrowed from his mother, who loved to tell him bedtime stories. To as authentic as possible to make the first declaration of love Shrek Fiona, Myers called into the studio his wife, Robin. A trifle, but pleases his wife, and cartoon benefits! Cameron Diaz not only voiced her character, but also added an important detail, making Princess Fiona... burp as savory as her "monster lover". They say that it wasn't in the script, Diaz was just embarrassed during the recording, but the filmmakers liked the sound so much that they decided to put it in the film. Antonio Banderas got into the role of the red-haired dueling cat so much that he took part in the dubbing not once, but three times! In addition to the English-language version, there are two more, aimed at the Spanish-speaking population.

No sooner had the film "Shrek the Third" began to show, and on the horizon already looms the fourth part. So have the three directors, Kelly Asbury, Conrad Vernon and Andrew Adamson, more than once to deal with the affairs of the "ogre-eater," who in the near future is unlikely to live "happily ever after" with his green girlfriend in his native swamp. Rumor has it that we will uncover the "secret behind the seven seals," regarding Shrek's past.
Shrek the ThirdTrailer
And that means we will find out how he got to this life, and whether his emigration was part of a well-thought-out plan to take over the magical universe...