"Shrek 1" (Shrek, 2001) tells an adult story with a fairy tale narrative strategy, but the plot is quite different from ordinary fairy tales. We can also regard it as a fairy tale. The "fairy tale" I am talking about here refers to "fairytales" (fantasy stories), not "tales for children" (children's stories). After all, many people say that the funny scenes in "Shrek" are not specially set for children. In fact, the trend of mass culture collection and research that began in the 18th century has already told us that the so-called "fairytales" are actually "folktales" (folktales) from the source, which includes not only folktale collectors. The written texts also include a large number of verbal texts. Sometimes, this verbal form will appear in the form of "ballads" (folk songs).
The German Grimm is the originator of fairy tales. He was born in linguistics, and it is the compilation of "The Collection of Grimm's Fairy Tales" that made him famous. Last year was the year of Andersen, and we must not forget the Danish. Another great tradition before "Shrek" was the Disney Company, but when our generation of childhood still remembered the fairy tale books on paper, the children in the late 1990s had already gained a sense of tradition through cartoon television and movies. Know it. After skipping the Greek myths and legends and Aesop's fables, we came to the new world created by DreamWorks. We can no longer call the story of DreamWorks a folk tradition, it is a complete fantasy story. "Shrek 1" is the famous work of DreamWorks. The first thing it needs to do is to establish its new world's position in front of tradition. So we can see how "Ogre" (Green Devil) Shrek (Shrek) exerts his authority in the plot.
At the beginning of the film, it was the introduction of a completely new character Shrek. The symbolic image of "Ogre" comes to a large extent from the magical literary genre in the romantic literary movement of the 18th and 19th centuries. Obviously, this is a certain distance from the folk oral literary tradition. As a traditionally believed demon, Shrek lives a solitary life that excludes outsiders. Until one day, a talking donkey broke into his life. Later, more "traditional" characters surrounded Shrek's residence with the intention of occupying his residence. And all this comes from the great villain Lord Farquaad. His kingdom, DuLoc, seems to be the kingdom that traditionally lives in—according to the plot, traditional fairy tale characters used to live here. But then Farquaad played the role of a Chinese city manager. All the fairy tale characters were driven out of the city, and the forest where Shrek lived was designated as their new residence. Shrek hopes to negotiate with Farquaad. The emergence of Shrek's "non-traditional" factor made Farquaad take the initiative to change his mind, although he was completely capable of killing Shrek. The villain wanted to complete a traditional heroic rescue operation, and hoped to usher in a fairytale ending in the traditional sense, but when he used Shrek to save the princess for him, he himself began to embark on a non-traditional The plot is on track. Therefore, Farquaad can't actually expect this non-traditional method to bring him a traditional ending.
Shrek and the talking donkey came to the castle where the fire-breathing dragon lived, and the princess was imprisoned in the high tower of the castle. What Magic Mirror tells Farquaad is a traditional plot, that is, the princess needs a hero's kiss to wake up from a deep sleep. In fact, another tradition is omitted here, that is, the hero must first slay the dragon, and the hero must finally fall in love with the princess and marry-this is the ultimate goal of the development of the story. But since Shrek didn't come for this purpose, he would never "reasonably" follow the storybook. But we see that Shrek cannot completely abandon the tradition. He was reading a traditional story book from the beginning, and in the Dragon Castle, when the donkey asked him how he knew the princess was imprisoned in the tower, Shrek replied that it was written like that in the story book. In the end, Shrek was accidentally thrown into the tower by the dragon's tail, and instead of kissing the princess, he woke the princess awake, and escaped from the cave without slaying the dragon.
We see that the princess is inherently non-traditional (the ending of the story), so when she tried to gain "true love" in the traditional shackles (the story uses the wizard's spell as a metaphor), she failed. She could only use the truest self. Let’s talk about a real love, or what the film thinks is “True Love”. She cooked breakfast for Shrek and defeated Robin Hood and his team with the Matrix's fist In the traditional frame, Shrek finally fell in love with this person who was of the same quality as himself. It can be said that by this time we already knew that Shrek did not love the beauty of the princess, otherwise the film would be difficult to justify. The princess shows another look at night, which is the climax of the whole story breaking away from tradition, and the climax of the story is actually when the audience understands that the princess is a green person.
The princess told the donkey that she was cursed by a witch when she was very young, one way during the day and another at night; this kind of magic will not be lifted until a man who really loves her kisses her. She thought that the ugly appearance at night was her fake appearance. She said that the reason why she did not show up at night was because who would fall in love with a green-skinned ugly monster? As a result, Shrek, who was eavesdropping outside the door, thought that the princess was talking about her, so he was very upset and immediately handed the princess to Farquaad. The ending of the story is that Shrek disturbed Farquaad's wedding under the persuasion of the donkey, and released the magic for the princess in the DuLoc church. The princess finally revealed her true appearance, that is, the appearance at night is her true appearance. The two began to live together.
In addition to the slightly far-fetched love between the donkey and the dragon, what impressed me in this film is the interaction between the residents of DuLoc and the protagonists of the story. Under Farquaad's autocratic rule, they must respond according to the king's will. So there are a few soldiers who are responsible for holding up signs to the audience. They just read "cheering", "applause", "laughing", "surprise" and so on. These DuLoc citizens have always been very obedient. Although they will have their own actions when they don’t raise the cards, as long as there are signs raised, none of them do not act according to the signs, even after Farquaad is swallowed by the dragon (this is a bit like "Jurassic Park"). The soldiers of the castle showed more free will than the citizens. After the villain disappeared, they took the initiative to write the scribbled "AWWWW" action on the sign, asking the citizens to be happy for the kiss between Shrek and the princess. These details are ironic.
"Shrek 1" American Pop style music is also fascinating, and many viewers look for the original soundtrack collection afterwards.
The film is a victory for DreamWorks against Disney, and a victory for mainstream contemporary American society to dissolve part of its traditions.
View more about Shrek reviews
