Left me cold

Rating: 3/10 (25 March 2006)

'Toy Story' is widely acclaimed for being the first film to rely entirely on computer animation; but in fact, it also had qualities that make it quite special among animated films. The ploy about obsolesce - a thinly disguised metaphor for human death - was amazingly dark for a "childrens'" film. The humour - centred on a toy spaceman who thinks he's a real spaceman - was incredibly sophisticated. And the metaphysic was entirely consistent throughout: every action the toys undertook was entirely in character, which meant that an adult could stay engaged throughout it's feature length. Many computer-animated movies since then have received similar rave reviews, but they haven't possessed these special qualities - and 'Ice Age' has none of them, just a bunch of annoying comedy animals and a by-numbers, episodic plot. There are other features of this film that also seem strange: the absence of any significant female characters, for example, and the unhappy contrast between the nicely rendered central characters and the static backdrops - it's like watching an old film where (human) actors pose in front of painted cardboard. It's also very strange to make the hero a hyperactive sloth with no slothful characterises at all. The best animated films have the same qualities as the best non-animated films, but I didn't find them in this film. And if you really want to watch a film where dinosaurs and humans roam the earth simultaneously, 'One Million Years B.C.' was actually more fun