Shrek

Shrek is a grumpy, smelly, and ugly ogre, living peacefully in a swamp. One night, he suddenly finds his land has been squatted by a mass of fairy-tale creatures (Pinocchio, the three little pigs, Peter Pan, Snow White, Cinderella, among others), who have been banished by the evil Lord Farquaad. One of these is a donkey (who just won't shut up). Accompanied by him, Shrek confronts Lord Farquaad, demanding his land back.

Farquaad does him a deal, telling him to rescue Princess Fiona from a dragon-guarded castle, to get his swamp back. Shrek and Donkey go and rescue the Princess, narrowly avoiding being burned by the dragon. Fiona is disgruntled about being rescued by an ugly ogre, rather than Prince Charming. However, despite their differences, she and Shrek grow fond of each other.

On the second night of their return journey, Fiona hides in a windmill. Donkey finds her and discovers that she's turned into an ogress. She explains that she's under a spell, which can only be broken by true love's first kiss. Shrek overhears part of this, but misunderstands and thinks she doesn't love him because he's ugly. Just as she decides to tell Shrek the truth, the sun rises and she becomes a beautiful princess again.

Lord Farquaad arrives and takes Fiona to his castle, and Shrek returns to his swamp. Both are miserable. Later, Shrek, Donkey, and Dragon head to Farquaad's castle, to try to stop Fiona from marrying him. He tells Fiona Farquaad's true intentions of marrying her. But the sun sets and Fiona becomes an ogress again. Farquaad doesn't want to marry her and sets the guards on everybody, but Dragon comes to the rescue and eats Farquaad. Shrek and Fiona kiss. Therefore, Fiona stays ugly (in conformity with the spell: "you find true love's first kiss and then take love's true form"), and marries Shrek, and they live "ugly" ever after.

Continuity mistake: At the end of the film, the three blind mice are turned into the horses for the onion carriage but a second later they are dancing on the piano. (01:21:10 - 01:22:00)

More mistakes in Shrek

Pinocchio: I'm not a puppet, I'm a real boy!
Captain of Guards: Five shillings for the possessed toy. Take it away.

More quotes from Shrek

Trivia: Shrek took more than four years to produce. One of the reasons it took so long was that Chris Farley had been cast as the voice of Shrek, but he died in late 1997 from a drug overdose in the middle of production. His lines had to be re-recorded by Mike Myers.

More trivia for Shrek

Question: In a movie with talking ogres, pigs, mice, wolves, and all sorts of animals, why is everyone so surprised to find a talking donkey?

Carl Missouri

Chosen answer: Who is "everyone"? The only person surprised he can talk is the one human who is processing the fairytale creatures for banishment, and this was used as a plot device to highlight a joke (between him flying and talking).

MovieFan612

Fiona also says "it talks", after he "saves his ass."

To be fair, she was locked in a castle for the majority of her life, so she wouldn't know that donkeys would be able to talk.

And yet he wasn't the only one surprised by it; watch the scene again and Fiona was surprised, too.

More questions & answers from Shrek

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.