Last year I took my students to watch Over the Hedge for their end of the school year field trip. This year my students decided they wanted to watch Shrek the Third.

I thought that the film fell very short of the previous two installments. It just wasn’t very entertaining. The first two films had great music, great dialogue, a good plot, and some really comical lines. This film lacked in all those departments. There was no energy, very little humor, and the storyline was very weak. I could have brought to class one of those straight to video cartoons and it would have probably been more entertaining than Shrek. My students were restless, some had fallen asleep, and I even noticed a few with their ipod headsets on instead of watching the movie.

I think children under the age of 10 would probably enjoy this film much more than my 11-12 year olds did. If you have youngsters, it would probably be worth a matinee. Otherwise skip the film and wait for its DVD release.

synopsis: Shrek and Fiona are having to take on the duties of being the active king and queen of Far, Far Away. When we left him, the King was quite literally croaking. They’re not very comfortable in these roles, so the King says to them, “If you can find the heir to the throne and bring him back, the Kingdom will be in good hands, then you can return to swamp and live your lives.” Which is what they want to do. Shrek, Donkey and Puss go to the far side of the Kingdom of Far, Far Away where young “Artie”, who is the nephew of Queen Lilian, is about to graduate school. Artie turns out to be young King Arthur and Shrek and Donkey and Puss have to convince this extremely rebellious young man, who’s being voiced by Justin Timberlake, to come back and assume the throne. Along the way, Shrek invents the Round Table, chivalry. Donkey is the Lady in the Lake with the sword. You get it. Meanwhile, back at the Kingdom of Far, Far Away, Prince Charming decides that it’s time for a coup d’etat.