What went so right with the 2001 movie inspired by the 1990 book "Shrek!"?

>>149360635 (OP)
standards were extremely low, so all you had to do was be a little quirky and it was objectively amazing. nevermind how hideous it is.

>>149360635 (OP)
I'm honestly really fascinated to know what the work atmosphere was like on Shrek 1. Apparently all the bosses at Dreamworks absolutely hated the test animation, so it's insane to think about what it required to turn things into a new direction.

it was just so kino it had to be a hit

>>149361091
that is definitely worse.. I can see why they were happier with the actual movie we got, grosslooking as it is.

>>149360635 (OP)
Shrek was fun and took risks, like >>149361091
No animation studio today wants to put in the work to see what sticks or what doesn't. Imagine if they were too lazy and just said FUCK IT and we got this ugly abomination today. Culture would be so vastly different without Shrek as a lighthouse beacon for creativity

>>149360635 (OP)
Watched that documentary about how A Goofy Movie was made, how throughout the production until he left Disney, Jeffrey Katzenberg was pushing for the movie to have heart rather than just be all gags. I fully believe that what saved the movie from being this
>>149361091
Because his fingerprints are all over the final product. The grudge against Michael Eisner manifested in “Lord Farquaad”, the celebrity voice cast (Katzenberg originally wanted Steve Martin to play Goofy, which would have been awful, but pushed the Goofy Movie voice performance in a more naturalistic direction it needed for the dramatic scenes) but most important for the quality of the movie, the moments where the references and action and humor stop and the characters get raw and real about their experiences. Read the book, and you’ll realize a Shrek movie didn’t have to be what it is, it could have been all trope subversion of fairy tales, gross out humor and irreverence, and everyone would have forgotten about it without that emotional core of an outcast finding connection with people despite his best efforts to push people away.

>>149361337
so you consider one of Shrek's positives... its emotional core? really.

>>149361091

>>149361436
Unironically yes, it wouldn’t have gotten the reviews it did without that element. It couldn’t have sustained multiple sequels. If it was all irreverence and fart humor without the protagonist’s sympathetic interior, it wouldn’t be rightly written off as a distraction.

>>149361490
So you think broad humor and emotional heart are the two things comprising this movie..

>>149360635 (OP)
How long before this guy tackles this movie?

>>149361490
*would be rightly written off

>>149361499
I think Ebert gave a pretty accurate review of it at the time. He praised its heart, its fast paced action, its irreverence toward the animation standard at the time, Disney, and how technically impressive it was. This was the consensus too IIRC, actually getting writing of emotional story beats from former Disney writers in your alt fairy tales that takes pot shots at Disney was what elevated it from just shaking a fist at the establishment to actually being a real challenge to that establishment.

>>149360635 (OP)
Shrek killed the animation industry.

>>149361612
Absurd statement, incredibly myopically focused on one country’s animation industry, and possibly indicative of your preference that the American “animation industry” be a monopoly.

>>149361647
nobody WANTS america to have a monopoly on animation, we just all but do. We share it with japan.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=GhMvzmizxpo&pp=ygUXQXdha2VuIGRldGhrbG9rIHNwZWQgdXA%3D

>>149362435
The monopoly was Disney. During the Disney Rennaissance, they were absolutely obliterating the competition, crushing out the competitors like Don Bluth who previously had some breathing room during the time Disney was struggling. That’s what the American animation industry was at that point, Disney and imported Anime. Companies like Dreamworks were what disrupted that domination, and Shrek was the kind of success Dreamworks needed to be able to survive as a viable competitor. People still made animated films outside the US, but Disney WAS the US animation industry at the time.

>>149362855
Rightly so. We have never been as good as a species as during the disney renaissance. That was it. Art peaked. Here and in Japan.