July 2009
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Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (U)
Printed 1st July 2009

In my 2006 review for Ice Age: The Meltdown, I ended with the proclamation that “a third Ice Age would be a welcome proposition” (paraphrased). Fast-forward to 2009 and the Dawn of the Dinosaurs: just look how right I was.

Now that this smug statement is out of the way, the review can commence. Picking up roughly twenty-two months (presuming theories about mammoth’s gestation periods are correct...) after the events of the watered-down leakquel, DotD finds woolly mammoths Manny and Ellie (voiced by Ray Romano and Queen Latifah respectively) caught-up in the expectation of their first little tusken-toddler whilst Diego the sabre-toothed tiger (Denis Leary) gets itchy padded paws craving excitement and adventure. Of course you should always be careful what you wish for, especially with Sid the trouble-magnet sloth (John Leguizamo) as part of your herd.

Finding a trio of oversized eggs seemingly abandoned under the ice, Sid rescues them before nursing them to hatching. What emerges are three tiny T-Rexes, followed swiftly by one giant pissed-off mama Tyrannosaurus. Taking her offspring back home with Sid along for the ride as well, his friends are left with no alternative but to follow below ice level on a rescue mission and more adventure than Diego could ever wish for.

The best Ice Age instalment yet, which bodes well for the already-in-production (if rumours are to be believed?) number thaw (sic), Dawn of the Dinosaurs initially actually threatens to be no more than your standard frosty era fare as the first 10-15 minutes pass-by with entertaining moments (Sid snow surfing) but nothing notable. Then this threequel shakes things up by descending to dinoworld and simultaneously ascending to a higher entertainment plane.

Brilliant, laugh-out-loud funny and, at times, a little bit bonkers for the remainder of its land of the lost-located runtime, DotD the film is akin to its best (and latest additional) character Buck the dino hunter. Voiced by Brit man-of-the-moment Simon Pegg, doing his best PotC parody, Buck is a one-eyed weasel (stop sniggering you immature ones at the back) on a mission to bring down the ubersaurus that rules the underground realm. Taking a time-out from Jurassic-hunting to help our anthromorphised heroes track down Sid, Buck steals the show in the same way Scrat has previously, hogging all the best individual moments and lines of sniggersome dialogue (“I turned a T-Rex into a T-Rachel”).

Perhaps part of the reason for this is also down to Scrat’s shtick now seriously starting to wear thin. In the first two Ice Age’s his mini-movie acorn adventures were arguably the chief attraction, now it’s all starting to get a bit boring. So perhaps its time to call a day on these unessential interludes? The shame of it is they had the perfect moment to finish on here but instead choose to take it that unnecessary one step further.

In an inspired montage sequence, Scrat’s elusive acorn appears lonely and jealous without his attentions after Scrat becomes increasingly-obsessed through the course of the film with female squirrel Scratte (Karen Disher). Without doubt the most emotionally-stirring inanimate object since Winston the volleyball in Cast Away, this is also one of the more surreal scenes you’ll see in any film this calendar year and the perfect way to summarise the bonkers brilliance on-display.

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