Article published March 15, 2002
MOVIE REVIEWS
Ice Age: A prehistoric adventure
Animated film is short on originality, but it's fun
By NANCIANN CHERRY
BLADE STAFF WRITER
Meet the weirdest herd of any Age: (L-R) Diego the saber-toothed tiger; Sid the sloth; and Manfred the woolly mammoth.
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AP Photo/Twentieth Century Fox
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Ray Romano makes a great woolly mammoth.
The star of Everybody Loves Raymond goes back in time for Ice Age, a prehistoric tale of adventure that is short on originality. If you've seen The Jungle Book or Tarzan, you know that when a baby is in danger, there will be kindly animals around to take care of him, even when bad-guy animals have other ideas. If you've seen any buddy movie with protagonists who rub each other the wrong way, you know they will be friends at the end.
On the other hand, although Ice Age isn't on a par with Shrek, Toy Story, or Beauty and the Beast, this new release from Twentieth Century Fox does sparkle with humor, charm, and enough suspense to keep things interesting.
| ICE AGE |
Directed by Chris Wedge and Carlos Saldanha. Screenplay by Michael Berg, Michael Wilson, and Peter Ackerman. A Twentieth Century Fox release, opening today at the Showcase Maumee, Franklin Park Cinemas, and Fox Woodville, and rated PG for a scene of mild peril.
Rating system: 5 stars - Outstanding; 4 stars - Very Good; 3 stars - Good; 2 stars - Fair; 1 star Poor
Critic's rating: 4 stars
Running time: 81 minutes.
VOICES:
Manfred - Ray Romano
Sid - John Leguizamo
Diego - Dennis Leary
Soto - Goran Visnjic
Scrat - Chris Wedge |
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The voice talents of Romano, John Leguizamo, and Denis Leary, among others, seem quite suited for their characters, and the animation is crisp and lifelike. OK, the humans look as if they came from a Diego Rivera painting rather than a Tommy Hilfiger ad, but considering the movie takes place in about the time of Cro-Magnon man, that's probably a more accurate representation.
It is during the autumn migration that Sid (Leguizamo), the smart-mouth, terminally lazy sloth, wakes up late and discovers that his family has left without him. This apparently is nothing new to Sid, who soon latches onto Manny, a woolly mammoth who is heading north. This doesn't seem right to Sid, but given the choice between heading south alone, which means he's an easy target for predators, and heading north with a big protector, Sid opts for saving his skin.
Manny is not happy about this, and he's even less pleased when they save a human baby - the baby's mother was trying to keep it safe from a pack of saber-toothed tigers. When Sid demands that they return the baby to the humans, Manny reluctantly agrees.
They get to the child's village but find it deserted, but Diego (Leary), a saber-toothed tiger, offers to lead them to the humans. Manny and Sid aren't keen on the idea, but they don't have much choice. What they don't realize is that Diego has his own agenda, which is to swipe the baby and take it to the tiger pack (which includes the voices of Goran Visnjic and Jack Black), which wants revenge on the humans for killing half its number.
As they travel, the strange group of animals encounters any number of obstacles, including volcanoes, avalanches, ice tunnels, and the challenge of changing a baby's diaper. One somewhat intense scene between the buddies and the tigers provides the movie with its PG rating.
In the tradition of the buddy-movie genre, the bulk of the dialogue is made up of wisecracks. Sid is the same sort of character Donkey was in Shrek, except that he's neither as smart nor as sensitive. The humor works on enough levels that adults will find Ice Age as engaging as youngsters will, even though the movie may seem awfully familiar.
There are a few inventive moments, including a clever but fleeting homage to evolution and an encounter with dodos who demonstrate that extinction was their only option. The major bit of originality is a little creature that looks like a combination of a squirrel and a rat. He appears throughout the movie, frantically attempting to bury his acorn. You're never quite sure when he's going to appear, but it's always fun when he does.
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