Shrek 2 – Eclecticism

Just got back in a bit ago from a very nice and very relaxing Thanksgiving weekend.

Friday after work I walked the block-and-a-half from the office building to Seattle’s Greyhound station and (after the requisite waiting around for an hour or so in a crowded, dingy bus terminal) hopped a bus out to Ellensburg and spent the weekend with Prairie. We had a very pleasant four days of doing next to nothing other than lying around, watching DVDs, and munching on Thanksgiving goodies. She’d made a really good Thanksgiving dinner (turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, stuffing, sweet potatoes with melted marshmallows on top, cranberry jelly, and pumpkin pie) that, true to form, lasted all weekend long.

We ended up watching Shrek 2 (good, of course), Van Helsing (entertaining moments, but overall really bad), The Stepford Wives (the new version — cute, but not great), Raising Helen (cute), and I’ve now seen the first three seasons of Friends (which, I have to admit, is a fun little sitcom), plus we went out to see National Treasure in the theater (not great, but definitely enjoyable).

Eventually, the weekend drew to a close, and after Prairie loaded my bag up with leftovers, I hopped the return bus to Seattle, and am home again.

It looks like my brother and his family visited Alaska for the holiday, and there a lot more baby pictures up on the family photo gallery, including this cute one of Kevin, Emily, and Noah.

“Pluto” by Björk from the album Homogenic (1997, 3:19).

We also saw Shrek 2, which was a far more enjoyable experience than Troy.

Not quite as strong as the first overall, but still very enjoyable, and quite funny. Eddie Murphy was actually funny (which only ever seems to happen in animated films anymore), and Antonio Banderas absolutely stole the show as Puss in Boots. The animation continues to get better and better, of course (some of the facial expressions are stunning to watch, especially Fiona’s as she faces the trial of introducing Shrek to her parents).

The real fun, though, was everything in the background. There is so much going on behind the actual action that it will easily take multiple viewings to catch it all, from references to other movies (Raiders of the Lost Ark, Mission Impossible, and Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, among others) to the stores in Far Far Away (Abercrombie and Witch, Tower of London Records, Old Knavery, and — of course — multiple Farbucks coffee stores [one of my favorite gags, in fact, was panicked people running out of a Farbucks under attack from a giant Gingerbread Man — directly into another Farbucks just across the street]).

The humor felt to me like it was pushed a little further to the adult side of the spectrum than the first Shrek was, too. Not so far that parents should question taking their children to the film (though do keep in mind that it is rated PG, not G), but definitely a lot for the adults to laugh at.

This one’s definitely worth checking out.

iTunes: “A Question of Time (New Town/Live)” by Depeche Mode from the album A Question of Time (1986, 11:08).