Thursday, August 27, 2009

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (2009) 5/10



ICE AGE 3: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS
DIRECTED BY: CARLOS SALDANHA AND MIKE THURMEIER
WRITTEN BY: PETER ACKERMAN, MICHAEL BERG, YONI BRENNER, JASON CARTER EATON, AND MIKE REISS


When the ever lovable Sid (John Leguizamo) decides to adopt 3 eggs he finds underground, he soon discovers a lost group of dinosaurs, living under the frozen world in which they habitat. But when the eggs turn out to be T-Rexs, and the mom comes to collect her babies, Sid is caught in the middle. Now Manny (Ray Romano), Diego (Dennis Leary), and crew must team up with adventerous weasel, Buck (Simon Pegg), in order to save their friend.

I'll admit I loved the first Ice Age movie, the three core characters were wonderfully written, and the storyline fun and exciting. Ice Age 2 on the other hand I found a massive dud. Trying to be the same, and yet different, Ice Age 2 felt like an over stretched attempt at being edgey and funny. Ice Age 3 is sort of a return to basics for the crew. Bring back cute kids, go crazy with some dinosaurs, and retread the oddballs quest guide.

It appears to me now though that the Ice Age crew are better at developing new characters than building old ones. In both 2 and 3, Sid and Diego feal like cardboard cutouts of the same character from the first film. No real growth, or new character arc presents itself for them, and as such they're basically only antic driven. Manny is the same big, grumpy, lovable character, only this time a father in waiting, and the only one with anything to really go off of. Last time they introduced the loveably quircky trio of Ellie, Crash, and Eddie. I didn't care much for these characters but they provided some solid kid friendly entertainment.

This time around the crew have come up with Buck, who it is safe to say deserved his own movie. Simon Pegg + Buck made this movie even worth watching, it wonderfully combines Peggs hilarious nature with a catchy character and fun attitude. Filled with layers, and absurdity sprinkled on top, I really wouldn't watch this movie again except to see Buck.

Visually, the artists' creativity and nack for visuals heavily outweighs the magnitude of the writing. In fact perhaps the movie had so many writers they couldn't figure out something worth writing about. In fact almost all of the jokes worth mentioning come from the commedians nature, and artists talent, making the writers feel almost secondary to the film, sort of a necessary evil to get to the visuals.


Ultimately Ice Age 3 is an intriguing affair, with a great character in Buck, but not really worth your money and time in order to rent.

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