Family values & other lessons

MANILA, Philippines – Film review: Ice Age 3: Dawn of the Dinosaurs Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs has got me all confused. Were there dinosaurs during the Ice Age. What about the woolly mammoth? Is there some proof they existed at the same time? Which came first, the Ice Age or the Jurassic era, during which dinosaurs and their ilk were supposed to have lived. The movie presents no answers.

Not that it tries to. The third installment of the lucrative Ice Age franchise, is not only a movie. It is also a fantasy. While there maybe some attempts to seem real, fantasies lead readers or in this case, movie-goers to believe or at the very least accept as fact for an hour or so, something that can never happen or exist. Some storytellers can be so adept at doing this that we can now entertain the thought that somewhere there can be a place named MiddleEarth.

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs goes even beyond that. It is an animated film. You know how it is with animation. There are no boundaries. It is anything goes. And Ice Age 3 pretty much pulls out all the stops. The filmmakers have thrown all logic to the winds. It makes me think of children playing pretend. They can upend a table and call it a cave or make a chair a pirate ship, a baby out of a teddy bear. No logic there. But for a few moments, kids can believe in anything. Those kids are the film’s target market and they will find lots of stuff to like in this picture.

Serving to anchor the story are the original characters, which has expanded to include Ellie, (Queen Latifah) the woolly mammoth who is Manny’s (Ray Romano) girlfriend. The two are going to have a baby and this drives Sid, (John Leguizama) the sloth, into wanting a family of his own. So he gets three dinosaur eggs to hatch and keep.

The problem arises when the mommy T-Rex arrives, grabs her babies, takes Sid in the process and goes underground. That is, literally underground. Everybody gives chase. And that is how the whole caboodle lands in a subterranean edition of Jurassic Park with venus fly-traps to boot.

Now Diego (Dennis Leary), the tiger has become domesticated. He doesn’t see Manny or Sloth or any of the other animals as dinner anymore. They are his family. But that is not the way it is with the dinosaurs and there is no Little Foot around to play hero. So in their desire to save Sloth, Manny, Ellie, Diego and the possums, Eddie (Josh Peck) and Crash (Sean William Scott) have definitely put themselves in a dangerous situation.

And when there is danger, there are thrills and movie-goers love thrills. So the imminent danger from the dinos provides Ice Age 3 with loads of suspenseful chases, falls, fights and all those other elements that make for great action cinema. Then because it is animated, the action possibilities are limitless and the animators guided by director Carlos Saldanha are at their wildest. Add to that the fact that if you can afford the P300 admission fee, you can watch the whole thing on 3D then you can rest assured that this is an extraordinary visual experience.

Parents would also welcome the family values, the joys of friendship, the importance of being yourself and other lessons the movie imparts. They will also like the bio-diverse setting. Lots of things to introduce and explain to the children and since kids have always loved dinos, having these on the screen despite those sharp teeth should add to Ice Age 3’s commercial appeal.

The voice performances are solid with Ray Romano and Queen Latifah once more playing straight against the energetic Leguizamo and his new sidekicks Scott and Peck. They should find more for Leary to do in the future as his crusty tiger seems to have grown frustrated over losing his usual appetites. Simon Pegg as the one-eyed weasel Buck is a welcome addition, although the others might wonder why he got the most showstopping lines.

Of course, there can be no Ice Age movie without the acorn obsessed Scrat. He has never had anything to do with the story but I find him so charming and I look forward to when he will turn up. I guess the moviemakers feel the same way, which is why they become more inventive than usual with the squirrel.

This time around, Scrat gets a rival/girlfriend named Scrate and a surprising discovery about his acorn. As usual Scrat’s portion is short, sweet and dialogue-free. It is another excellent piece of filmmaking. If they keep him this way, he might just become Ice Age’s reason for being in the years to come.