Shrek and Shrek 2 | They’re Love, They’re Life and help shape the current animation industry

[YM!]

 

The rise of CG animation started with Pixar’s Toy Story, one of the films such as Lion King, Aladdin, and Beauty and The Beast showed that animated films can be blockbusters, grossing $191M domestically and the biggest film of 1995.

 

At the same time, an angry Katzenberg fired from Disney by Michael Eisner, got a huge settlement and teamed up with Steven Spielberg and made Dreamworks. The animation arm was poised to be a direct competitor to Dreamworks, the first films were the CGI Antz which was the first film due to the Eisner beef and Bug’s Life and grossed $90M DOM, the hand drawn The Prince of Egypt which was the second non Disney animation to gross over $100M DOM, the flop The Road to El Dorado and Aardman co-production Chicken Run which also grossed over $100M DOM and still the biggest stop motion movie ever.

 

Then came Shrek, which went through development hell and multiple versions such as a traditional animated film to a live action/CGI hybrid, and went for a full CGI film. 

 

The project was huge risk but had a huge pay-off, the film was a critical darling at 88% on Rotten Tomatoes, exploded and made $42.3M on its opening weekend, then the second weekend jumped 0.3% on Memorial Day Weekend making $42.5M for the three day and $55.2M for the four day, as it ended with a total of $267.7 million domestically, along with $216.7 million overseas, for a worldwide total of $484.4 million, becoming the fourth biggest film of 2001, behind only Monsters Inc, Lord of The Rings and Harry Potter. Shrek also won the first ever Academy Award for Best Animated Feature 

 

The sequel, Shrek 2, also was an unprecedented breakout and was widely regarded as one of the best sequels, was met with immense hype and moved to a five day weekend, grossing $21M for the Wednesday and Thursday which was deemed as disappointing at first but then exploded more. It scored the 2nd biggest, 3 day opening weekend in U.S. history and the largest opening for an animated film at the time of its release at $108M, and ended its run at $441.2 million domestically and $478.6 million in foreign markets for a total of $919.8 milion worldwide, making it the biggest film in 2004 as it lost it’s worldwide record to Toy Story 3 in 2010 but kept the domestic record for 12 years until Finding Dory overtook.

 

The success of Shrek alongside Pixar cause a wave of CG animation to hit the market as well as more imitations trying to cash in on Shrek’s successors that even Disney tried with Chicken Little.

 

Discuss yo’ thoughts.

 

 

Edited January 30, 2020 by YourMother the Edgelord

[Darth Lehnsherr]

Shrek 2 is still one of the best sequels of all time IMO. That film was arguably the animated film I most rewatched back in the early 2000s and that's in the midst of the great Pixar films at the time. It's a shame that DreamWorks never really had the same type of success again despite other quality series like HTTYD and Kung-Fu Panda. 

[Eric Wick]

 

[Eric Wick]

 

[Eric Wick]

 

[excel1]

Shrek is still hilarious to this day. All the 3 of the leads got so filthy rich of the series that they all retired!

Edited December 15, 2020 by excel1

[Eric Wick]

 

[excel1]

I feel old. Great movie that has aged slightly - lots of late 90s/early 2000s references - but is still great.

[lab276]

First film I saw twice in theatres! Definitely one of my favourite from the 2000s, although I haven't seen it in a while. I daresay though that I probably don't need to see again as it's one of those movies that's burned into my brain.

Edited May 19, 2021 by lab276

[Eric Wick]

3 hours ago, lab276 said:

First film I saw twice in theatres! Definitely one of my favourite from the 2000s, although I haven't seen it in a while. I daresay though that I probably don't need to see again as it's one of those movies that's burned into my brain.

[Eric Wick]

 

[excel1]

Shrek easily no doubt 

[Chicago]

Shrek is arguably the most well casted Animation movie of all time. Donkey is just hilarious 

[jb007]

I loved Shrek and Shrek2. Watched it multiple times at the theater and many more times at home. I started watching more animated movies because of Shrek.

 

This from someone who had rarely watched animated movies but for a few classics like The Jungle Book, The Lion King...

[Eric Wick]

 

[JustLurking]

Hard to believe it's been 21 years. I'm still in love with Shrek 2. Always a fun watch no matter how many times I've seen it.

[dudalb]

I still find the glee with which Shrek 1 attacks Eisner to be funny as hell.

 

And my favorite Shrek line is still "Dead Broad On Table! OUT..NOW".