I´m A Believer (In Different Fairy Tales)

Everybody loves the classic movie, Shrek, and the story of true love between two people. What people don´t always realize is that Shrek actually uses humor to take a jab at the typical form of a fairy tale. Shrek has little fairy tale creatures come to his land and take over. In the quest to get his land back, Shrek must find the Princess Fiona. In the quest to rescue the Princess, Fiona fights and defeats her enemy with very little weapons.

Shrek takes the form of a Horatian satire. Horatian satire is defined as a story in which the vice that is used is indulgent, tolerant, amused, and witty. Horatian satire points out general human failings. In this case, humans have failed to realize that fairy tales can be much more than a love story about a damsel in distress. The movie uses exaggeration, incongruity, and reversal to get its message across. Shrek uses exaggeration when Princess Fiona fights and successfully defeats Robin Hood and all of his Merry Men without any help and without any weapons. Shrek uses incongruity when Princess Fiona uses her ponytail to deliver a knockout punch to one of the Merry Men. While frozen in a mid-air martial arts kick, Princess Fiona pauses to fix her disheveled hair before knocking out two of the Merry Men. The main form of satire in Shrek is reversal when the roles of the hero and the damsel in distress have been reversed. In this movie, it is Princess Fiona, the rescuee, who fights and defeats the foe. Shrek mocks traditional fairy tales with the role reversal of Princess Fiona as a heroine, instead of a damsel in distress. Fiona is also not the typical Disney princess, proving that beauty is more about the inside than the outside. Shrek departs from the traditional fairy tale in hilarious ways in order to attempt to change our perception of fairy tales by reversing the role of the female protagonist.