Once upon a time in a kingdom far, far away was a character called Shrek, and through his film series we got a spin-off starring Puss in Boots. It’s been 22 years since the first Shrek came out and it’s been 19 years since we were first introduced to Puss in Boots in Shrek 2, voiced with charisma by Antonio Banderas. I’m giving you these facts because after two decades you would have thought that this franchise might have already seen better days, and to be honest I was kind of expecting that with this sequel Puss in Boots: The Last Wish. That is only because usually sequels, let alone sequels to spin-off’s, very rarely perform better than the first film, but this film genuinely wows the audience and even supersedes the quality of the first film, both visually and thematically!
The sequel, Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, sees the legendary character of Puss in Boots back to his swashbuckling and adventuring, only he’s just discovered he has gone through eight of his nine lives. Now on his last life he begins to have an existential crisis as he believes he is no longer the figure of legend that he makes himself out to be. Luckily for him there is a discovery made of a map to a wishing star. This leads him to another lofty adventure to give him back his nine lives, but he has Jack Horner, Goldilocks and the Three Bear Crime Family and a mysterious and dangerous Wolf hot on his tail. Not to mention his previous love interest Kitty Softpaws is back as well as newbie Perrito, a wannabe-therapy dog voiced by Harvey Guillén. It may sound stuffed with characters, but each one of them has a story to tell and a reason to seek out the wishing star.
What surprised me about the film was the heavy themes it explores. Yes, this is a family fun adventure film but there are aspects of mortality, death as well as dysfunctional family relationships interwoven into the plot of the theme. Florence Pugh’s Goldilocks is an orphan raised by bears, Guillén’s Perrito just wants to be friends with Puss and Kitty and John Mulaney’s Big Jack Horner is just plain greedy and has no moral compass, which does bring about some funny moments but sadly Horner feels a bit more one-dimensional than the other characters. It is Wagner Moura’s character of the Wolf that shocked me the most though. The Wolf is a truly terrifying villain, one which has an almost supernatural presence and has his own reasons for wanting to kill Puss in Boots. These character’s journeys are engaging, entertaining to watch and engrossing to learn from with help from a stellar voice cast.
The one element of the film I haven’t talked about is the visuals. Ever since the release of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse other film studios appear to be exploring their own styles of CGI by diverting away from photo-realistic imagery which companies like Pixar still seem to stick with. Instead we have a clunky, comic-book look which looks like CGI mixed with paintings and graphic novels. It’s a unique look and one that makes the film pop with colour and vibrancy. It’s extremely impressive to witness the action sequences, especially with the final action set-piece, with each one feeling like they’re popping out of the cinema screen. This helps give the film a cinematic look and I urge everyone to see this film on the big screen because the film feels so much more alive than other animated films. The music, the art direction and the storytelling vastly succeed the first film and help to make this film feel distinctive and unique, which isn’t always an easy task.
★★★★☆
4/5
Final Verdict:
Puss in Boots: The Last Wish leaves a warm fuzzy feeling in your stomach. It’s a beautifully crafted film with a lot of very strong and striking visuals. The storytelling and the animation work hand-in-hand to deliver something new and unique and actually improves upon the first film in a lot of different ways, which a lot of animated sequels do forget to do. Puss may be down to his last life but he has no signs of disappearing off into the sunset anytime soon, with hopefully more stories to come.
Thanks for reading today’s blog!
Alex Murray, the Head of Eyesight Productions
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