Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Carlos Saldanha Co-director: Michael Thurmeier
Written by	Michael Berg Peter Ackerman Mike Reiss Yoni Brenner
Produced by	Lori Forte John C. Donkin
Starring	Ray Romano Queen Latifah Denis Leary John Leguizamo Seann William Scott Josh Peck Simon Pegg Chris Wedge Karen Disher
Edited by	Harry Hitner
Music by	John Powell
Production company	Blue Sky Studios
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release date	July 1, 2009 (2009-07-01)
Running time	94 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$90 million
Box office	$887,066,842

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs, also known as Ice Age 3, is a 2009 3-D computer animated film. It is the third installment of the Ice Age series, produced by Blue Sky Studios and distributed by 20th Century Fox. A sneak preview was shown in selected theaters on Father's Day in the United States. The film features the voices of Ray Romano, John Leguizamo, Denis Leary, Queen Latifah, Seann William Scott, Josh Peck, Simon Pegg, and Chris Wedge. The story has Sid being taken by a female Tyrannosaurus rex after stealing her eggs, leading the rest of the protagonists to rescue him in a tropical lost world inhabited by dinosaurs beneath the ice. Despite mixed reviews by critics, Dawn of the Dinosaurs became the second highest grossing animated film of all time with $887 million worldwide.

Plot

Ellie (Queen Latifah) and Manny (Ray Romano) are expecting their first child, and Manny is obsessed with making life perfect and safe for the family, since his first experiences as a husband and father went bad when his family was killed by hunters. At the same time, Diego (Denis Leary) finds himself unable to catch a cocky gazelle (Bill Hader) he has been stalking and decides to leave the herd, believing that he is losing his predatory nature as a tiger. Sid (John Leguizamo) grows jealous of Manny and Ellie and "adopts" three apparently abandoned eggs that he finds in an icy underground cavern and call them Eggbert, Shelly, and Yoko. Manny tells him to put them back, but Sid instead looks after the eggs, which hatch into baby Tyrannosaurus the next morning.

Although Sid tries his best to raise the three dinosaurs, their rambunctious behavior scares away all the other animals' young and ruins a playground Manny built for Ellie's baby. A female Tyrannosaurus, Momma, whose eggs Sid stole, soon returns and carries both Sid and her young underground, with Diego in pursuit. Manny, Ellie, Crash, and Eddie (Seann William Scott, Josh Peck) follow as well and discover that the icy cavern leads to a vast jungle populated by dinosaurs thought to be extinct. Here, an Ankylosaurus threatens the herd despite Diego's efforts to fend it off; they are saved from a further crowd of angry reptiles by an insane, one-eyed weasel named Buckminster, or Buck (Simon Pegg).

Buck has been living in this jungle for some time and is chasing Rudy, a large albino Suchomimus, with the intention of avenging the loss of his left eye at Rudy's hands. He agrees to lead the herd through the jungle's perils to Lava Falls, where Momma has taken Sid and her babies. At one point, they have to cross the "Chasm of Death" which if filled with gas fumes (a mixture of helium and laughing gas, casuing anyone who breathes in it to laugh uncontrollably while speaking in a high-pitched voice). In the meantime, Sid and Momma try to outdo each other in feeding the offspring; he loses this contest, but is soon welcomed into the family regardless. The next day, however, Sid is separated from the family and attacked by Rudy. Sid is knocked onto a loose rock slab that is floating on a river of lava and about to plummet over the falls.

As the herd moves toward Lava Falls, Ellie goes into labor and a Guanlong pack strikes, causing a rock slide that separates her from Manny and Diego. Manny doubles back to protect her and Diego fends off further attacks, while Buck takes Crash and Eddie ahead to rescue Sid. Just as he goes over the falls, the trio swoops in on a commandeered Pteranodon only to been chased by a flock of Quetzalcoatlus on the way and saves his life. Manny reaches Ellie, and there is suddenly a reaction, the cry of a newborn baby, then he sees that it is a girl. He wants to name her Ellie, or Little Ellie, but Ellie instead names her Peaches after the fruit (and the codeword they had chosen for Ellie to use if she went into labor during the trip). Sid is saddened at the fact that he never had a chance to say goodbye to "his" children as he returns to the herd and learns of Peaches' birth.

As they venture back to the tunnel, they are shocked to discover Rudy lurking inside of the entrance. Rudy exits the tunnel and attacks at full force; Buck lures Rudy away from the group and is nearly eaten himself, before Diego saves him at the last second. Manny, Sid, Diego, and Buck manage to ensnare Rudy and knock him unconscious, but as they begin to leave, Sid trips over one of the ropes and breaks it. Rudy quickly recovers and escapes, and is about to attack Sid when Momma arrives on the scene, charging at Rudy and knocking him off a cliff before roaring her victory. As she and her children wish Sid well, Buck – now without a purpose in life since Rudy is gone – decides to join the herd and live on the surface. However, a distant roar tells him that Rudy is still alive; he changes his mind and sends the herd home, blocking off the path to the underground jungle at the same time so that no one else can go down there. Manny and Ellie welcome Peaches into their frozen world and admit that Sid did a good job looking after Momma's children (though Manny tells Diego that he will never let Sid babysit Peaches). Diego decides to remain with the herd, while Buck stays where he wants to be: underground, battling it out with Rudy.

Scrat and Scratte

Like the previous Ice Age films, the film opens with the saber-toothed squirrel Scrat (Chris Wedge), who does everything he can to retrieve his precious acorn. This time, he falls in love with his female counterpart Scratte (Karen Disher), with the song "You'll Never Find Another Love Like Mine" by Lou Rawls playing in the background, but an acorn appears instead after the music stops. The two fight over the acorn with Scatte is flung off the ground. As Scrat tries to save her, the two hold onto the acorn and the music starts back. Suddenly, she demonstrates her ability to glide like a flying squirrel, leaving Scrat falling to the ground. The two eventually fall in love after Scrat saves her from falling to her death in the lava river while she is unconscious. He even chooses to focus his attention on her instead of the acorn until the end of the film, when he tires of her finicky nature and reverts to his old ways. The ensuing fight between the couple leads to a volcanic explosion that hurls Scrat and the acorn back to the surface, leaving Scratte trapped underground. However, as Scrat is about to enjoy his acorn, a stray piece of ice falls on him and knocks the acorn back into Scratte's hands. He screams in frustration, having lost both his acorn and Scratte.

Cast

• Ray Romano as Manny
• Queen Latifah as Ellie
• Denis Leary as Diego
• John Leguizamo as Sid
• Josh Peck and Seann William Scott as Crash and Eddie
• Simon Pegg as Buck
• Chris Wedge as Scratt
• Karen Disher as Scratte

Production

Blue Sky decided to do "more of a what-if adventure" in the third Ice Age installment, titled Ice Age: A New Beginning, "like finding the giant ape in King Kong or a Shangri-la in the middle of snow," and added the dinosaurs to the story. Character designer Peter de Sève welcomed the new plot addition, since he could not think of any other giant mammal to put into the story. The "lost world" approach led to colorful dinosaurs, because "the dinosaurs didn't have to be just brown, and you can take liberties because no one knows what color they were", according to de Sève. Rudy's design was inspired by the Baryonyx because of his crocodile-like look, which de Sève considered even more menacing than the T. rex.

The film was released in RealD where available. The release sparked some controversy when Fox announced that it would no longer pay to supply 3D glasses to theaters, which led to a number of exhibitors threatening to only show the film in standard 2D projection.

The film's original trailer debuted with the film Horton Hears a Who! on March 14, 2008, then online on April 7, 2008. There are three others that have been released, with the third and fourth (which shows Buck) being the most closely resembling each other. Queen Latifah recorded a cover of the song "Walk the Dinosaur".

Reception

Critical response

The film received mixed reviews from critics. As of August 12, 2009, Rotten Tomatoes reported that 44% of critics gave positive reviews based on 140 reviews with an average score of 5.4/10. Among Rotten Tomatoes' Cream of the Crop, which consists of popular and notable critics from the top newspapers, websites, television, and radio programs, the film holds an overall approval rating of 37% based on 27 reviews. Another review aggregator, Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 top reviews from mainstream critics, the film has an average score of 51% based on 23 reviews.

However, Roger Ebert gave the film three and a half stars out of four claiming that " Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs is the best of the three films about our friends in the inter-species herd of plucky prehistoric heroes. And it involves some of the best use of 3-D I've seen in an animated feature." Lou Lumenik of the New York Post awarded the film 3 stars stating that the film is "much more of an emphasis on action in this nicely crafted, fast-paced sequel." Keith Phipps of the A.V. Club graded the film a C+ claiming the sequel "throws its commitment to the era away with movie number three, a ploy sure to anger Ice Age purists everywhere." Carrie Rickey of the Philadelphia Inquirer enjoyed the "film's animation art is Seuss-imaginative", but panned "the flatness of the story and indifferent voicework all the more obvious."

Box office

The film made $13,791,157 on its opening day in 4,099 theaters. It reached approximately $42,320,877 on its opening weekend. Studio estimates showed it tying the previous week's champion Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, but the actual grosses showed Transformers as the victor for that weekend. It grossed $66 million after 5 days, $151.7 million internationally for a total of $218.4 for the first week, breaking The Simpsons Movie's $170.9 million record for biggest opening worldwide for an animated film and 9th overall. The film was a box-office success, and became 20th Century Fox's second highest grossing film of 2009.

It currently stands at $196.4 million domestically and $690.4 million overseas, which gives it a worldwide gross of $886.8 million. It is the third highest-grossing film of Template:Fy behind Avatar & Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, the 16th highest grossing film of all time and the second highest gross for an animation, behind Shrek 2. The film also took the place of Titanic as the biggest all-time box office hit in Bulgaria and Brazil. The film currently holds the fourth highest international gross of all time, following Titanic, The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, and Avatar.

Home media

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs was released on high-definition Blu-ray Disc and standard DVD in North America on October 27, 2009 and in the United Kingdom on November 23, 2009. Two versions of the DVD exist: the 3-Disc Special Edition and the "Scrat Pack" with a Scrat plush toy.

Unlike the previous Ice Age films, the DVD will be released as 20th Century Fox's Halloween gift in North America with Scrat in it and will include the standard 2-D version and the theatrical 3-D version, plus two special Scrat shorts such as Scrat's Missing Adventure (from the Ice Age DVD) and No Time for Nuts (from the Ice Age: The Meltdown DVD).

The 3-Disc Special Edition DVD includes the Blu-ray, DVD and Digital Copy and provides hours of extra fun for the entire family including an Ice Age digital story book maker, commentary by director Carlos Saldanha, deleted scenes, making-of featurettes, two special Scrat shorts, a how-to-draw Scrat tutorial with the filmmakers and much more.

The Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs "Scrat Pack" Double DVD Pack includes three Scrat games exclusive to the disc.

Video game

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
North American boxart, Wii version
Developer(s)	Eurocom
Publisher(s)	Activision
Platform(s)	Games for Windows, Nintendo DS, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 2, Wii, Xbox 360
Genre(s)	Platform game
Mode(s)	Single-player

The Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs video game from Activision was released on the Xbox 360, Wii, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 2, Games for Windows, and Nintendo DS on June 30, 2009. A demo was made available in the Xbox Live Marketplace on June 15, 2009. The game allows the player to take control of Manny, Sid, Diego, Scrat, Scratte and Buck as they take on or run away from dangerous dinosaurs, roll eggs to safety, chase for their beloved acorn, and explore caves and jungles.

External links

• Official UK website
• Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs at IMDb
• Template:Bcdb title
• Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs at AllMovie
• Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs at Box Office Mojo
• Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs at Rotten Tomatoes