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Friday, March 31, 2006
Ice Age: The Meltdown (More Scrat!)
Well, Ice Age: The Meltdown gets one thing right about that frigid time period: this lame sequel moves about as fast as a glacier.
I enjoyed the original Ice Age, even though it was more a derivative mix of Looney Tunes, Pixar and DreamWorks movies than anything truly original. The prehistoric characters were well voiced by Ray Romano, Denis Leary and especially John Leguizamo, who are all back this time, and it was fun to hear them play off of each other.
Ice Age: The Meltdown, however, isn’t even an effective clone of the first movie. The sequel makes the colossal mistake of making the characters go off on their own separate little adventures, which evaporates the chemistry that made Ice Age fun.
As seems to be the case with all prehistoric animated features, the animals are facing the threat of death unless they move somewhere else. As the title suggests, the ice is melting, which will flood the valley the animals live in, so they have to find safe harbor.
Along the way, Manny is thrilled to meet a female mammoth named Ellie, voiced by Queen Latifah. There’s just one little problem. Having been raised by a family of possums, Ellie thinks she’s one too.
You read that right, folks. A two-ton wooly mammoth thinks she’s a two-pound possum, which adds up to a trunkload of malarkey.
Steve Martin got away with thinking he was born a poor black child in The Jerk, but he had the comic talent to pull it off. Queen Latifah’s voice can’t make the joke work, nor can the animators or writers. Maybe Ellie can hang from a tree, but I couldn’t suspend my disbelief. This gag is an insult to the intelligence of anyone over the age of 6.
Now, I know what some people will say. C’mon, Eric, it’s a cute movie for little kids, not crabby critics. Lighten up.” I’d like to, but if the movie is really for little kids, why did the writers include sly sexual innuendo between Manny and Ellie, thus earning the movie a PG-rating?
I’m sure the filmmakers wanted to include some gags aimed at parents, but this is a movie for undiscriminating children to enjoy, and for the adults who accompany them to endure.
As much as I advocate seeing movies theatrically, I admit home video has a distinct advantage when moves are bad: fast-forwarding to the good parts.
This movie has one saving grace, and it’s the same character that was the highlight of the first Ice Age: Scrat, the little saber-toothed squirrel. His imaginative misadventures in chasing his elusive acorn are hilarious and a welcome break from the tedium. This is where the chapter-skip button will come in handy.
If they must make Ice Age: The Meteor, I suggest they make Scrat the star. GRADE: C-
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‘Dallas’ saved?
The IMDB’s celebrity news feed says that director Robert Luketic has bailed on directing the movie version of Dallas I blogged about earlier.
If Betty Thomas does replace him, as the item suggests, then I reverse my prediction of dread. Thomas also made The Brady Bunch Movie, which blindsided me with its hilarious satire.
If she can bring the same spirit of invention to Dallas, it just might work.
New in Theaters: Icy Instincts and more
ATL: No, it’s not a movie about automated teller machines with a typo in the title, but an homage to roller rinks with a hip-hop edge.
Basic Instinct 2: Anyone else find it amusing that a sequel to a movie that prominently featured an ice pick comes out the same day as the Ice Age sequel?
Ice Age: The Meltdown: Manny and his pals return, minus most of their wit. Thank god for Scrat.
Slither: Certainly a better title than “AAAAHHHH! Wait, what ARE those things?”
Permalink | Comments (1) | Categories: In Area Theaters
