Shrek the Third 2nd trailer
Is DreamWorks' glass slipper about to break?
A new Shrek the Third trailer is now online. Will it get hearts and wallets pumping for this flick or is the Shrek gravy train about to run out of steam?
(Source: movies.aol.com)
Despite getting cosier with Disney management, DreamWorks' forecast is slightly less than rosy. The first trailer for Shrek the Third didn't go over as well as they would have liked, and they're hoping this one will make a little more positive noise.
DreamWorks has already produced Shrek the Halls for this Christmas, is tooling up for Shrek 4 and is contemplating a fifth flick (as well as a possible Puss in Boots spin-off). You see why a lot is riding on Shrek the Third.
So does this new Shrek the Third trailer rock? I'd have to give it a definite 'meh': there are some funny bits but I can't escape a sense of "been there, done that, bought the t-shirt" vibe that's coming off this flick. I'm not totally ready to dismiss this flick just yet but I'm not ready to camp out the night before Shrek the Third's May 18th release date. Check out the link and let everyone know what you think.
Also: a final word on the Aardman/DreamWorks debacle, that resulted in the two studios severing ties after 3 movies together. According to Jim Hill, the whole collaboration failed mainly because DreamWorks didn't know what to do with Aardman Animation once they got together. Aardman had made its reputation with animation which traded heavily on British-style humour, like the award-winning Wallace and Gromit series. DreamWorks, unfortunately, didn't get it.
Starting with 2000's Chicken Run, DreamWorks tried to get Aardman to tone down many of those British elements which had made them so successful in the first place, because Katzenberg and Co. thought American audiences wouldn't "get" the British humour.
Here's an irony: DreamWorks turned down Aardman's first proposal for a post-Chicken Run animated flick, the mockumentary Tortoise Versus Hare, a send up of the Aesop's fable. Not even the fact that Michael Caine was cast as the tortoise changed their minds. Instead, DreamWorks wanted a Wallace and Gromit feature (Wallace and Gromit being Aardman's best-known property) but they wanted the British studio to replace veteran Wallace voice actor Peter Sallis, a decision that would have infuriated long-time fans.
(Now Tortoise Versus Hare has been announced as Aardman's first post-DreamWorks project, with Bob Hoskins as the tortoise.)
DreamWorks later asked for constant story changes on both Wallace and Gromit in the Curse of the Were-Rabbit and Flushed Away, which took a lot of that Anglo charm from both those movies.
Not only that, the bickering over scripts and movies drove Flushed Away's costs up so much that there was no way the movie could make it all back in theatres.
Now North American audiences have shown themselves capable of embracing extremely British comedy (Monty Python anyone?), and there is a sizable market for Anglo humour on North American DVD shelves. However, as 2005's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy conclusively proved, an attempt to bridge the gap between Brit and Yank humour ends up creating a beast that's neither fish nor fowl, and stinks either way.
