Every classic fairy tale includes a beautiful princess, adragon-guarded tower, and a handsome prince. "Shrek," however, blastsaway all fairy-tale clichés. The hero, Shrek, is a giant green ogre withtrumpet-like ears who lives alone in a swamp. The local authority figure, LordFarquaad, in an effort to retain the "perfection" of his town Duloc,orders that all fairy-tale creatures be rounded up and confined to the swampwhere Shrek lives.

Shrek is enraged to find his once-private homelittered with such familiar characters as Pinocchio, Snow White and Tinkerbell.He barges into Duloc to complain to Lord Faquaad, but Farquaad has plans of hisown - he wants to marry a princess, any princess, so that he can become a king.

Lord Farquaad thus makes a deal with Shrek: Farquaad will return theswamp if Shrek rescues Princess Fiona from a stereotypical fairy-tale tower,guarded, of course, by a fire-breathing dragon.

Shrek's adventures inrescuing Princess Fiona are hilarious on two levels. There is obvious,predictable humor for younger viewers, and another level of humor for olderviewers. While I appreciated the attempt to appeal to these disparate audiences,the storyline failed to capture my interest.

The movie as a whole isillogical and unrealistic, and Shrek seems more childishly disgusting than hewould be for an older audience. The stars who provide the voices (Mike Myers,Eddie Murphy, Cameron Diaz and John Lithgow) are more of an attraction than theplot. I enjoy celebrity movies as much as anyone, but perhaps the makers of"Shrek" should have spent their budget on the script instead of theactors.