My Review of Puss in Boots (2011) · 8:47pm Sep 10th, 2023
Rating Scale:
12/10—a complete masterpiece; flawless and outstanding
11/10—Excellent, near-perfect film
10/10—the standard rating; awesome film with a couple of flaws
9/10—a wonderful film with several flaws
8/10–a great film with numerous flaws but not enough to ruin it
7/10—a fun and entertaining movie; not great but still enjoyable
6/10—a slightly above average film; it is something I might watch again
5/10—mediocre movie; not awful but not great either
4/10—a below average film; it could have been much better
3/10—a bad film; poorly written and poorly executed
2/10—a very bad movie; the few good things in the movie overshadowed by the bad things
1/10—a terrible movie; a total waste of time
0/10—a worthless piece of abomination; should have never been made
Greetings, everyone! This is Mr. J back with another movie review for today! This afternoon, I will be reviewing DreamWorks’ “Puss in Boots” from 2011! As some of you may remember, I did a movie review on its magnificent sequel earlier this year which was a lot of fun to do.
As I promised a friend of mine, I have saved this film for this year alongside “Over the Hedge”. So in preparation for this review, I decided to re-watch it early this morning. And I gotta say…it was pretty good for its first spin-off of the Shrek franchise.
This movie is about a walking, talking cat—the fearless outlaw, sneaky feline, and daring fighter—Puss in Boots. As he hunts down the tree magical beans from the infamous Jack and Jill, he meets an old friend and a new ally.
Now, the story here is pretty interesting; it’s basically a tale of two brothers who did everything together but are ultimately separated by misfortune and betrayal. Now that fate has intertwined their paths once again, it is up to them to fix what was broken. But as it turns out, Humpty Dumpty was cooking up an elaborate scheme to get revenge on Puss for abandoning him years ago.
The way their relationship is written is really well done. It makes Humpty both sympathetic as a character and unlikable as an antagonist. Likewise, we see how Puss came to be what he is now and what he really wants to do.
But as for Kitty Softpaws, this film introduces her as a cliche love interest for the main character until it’s later revealed she had a part to play in the villain’s plot and then tries to redeem herself at the end. She’s not that interesting of a character here, but fortunately, the sequel made her a lot more fleshed out.
As for Jack and Jill, they were decent villains for the most part. I do admit I don’t know much about these guys from the actual source material, but here in this movie, they were fun to watch but sadly a little one-dimensional in my opinion.
The animation is still awesome to look at which reminds me how much I miss the unique 3D animation style of the Shrek universe.
The soundtrack may be a hit-and-miss, but the voice acting was still top notch. Antonio Banderas never loses his touch in voicing Puss; even the other actors—Billy Bob Thornton, Amy Sedaris, Zach Galifianakis, and Salma Hayek—were all great as their respective characters.
The movie does have some solid action scenes as well. It perfectly balances its comedic tone and its serious setting in a story like this. Thus, it makes viewers even more invested in Puss in Boots and want to see more of him in future animated films.
With all that said, I will rate this a mighty 9/10. Although this was a great film, I still prefer “The Last Wish” over this. But hey, if it weren’t for this film, then we wouldn’t have a masterpiece of a sequel, now would we?
Peace out!
This movie was very important to me as a kid. Puss in Boots was the only spaniard character I had on media (luckily, disney´s next movie takes place in Spain so more spanish characters, yaaay
), so I was thrilled when I found out they were doing a movie of him. It still takes a special place in my heart, but like you I prefer Puss in Boots: The Last Wish. At first I was hesitant about the second, but I think it fleshes the characters better and the designs are gorgeous.
Personally, the main issue I had with the film was the pacing. Something about it felt either too quick or straightforward despite the runtime.
But, I still enjoyed the film regardless.