Part of the Herd

Rating: 7/10 (29 April 2002)

Director Carlos Saldanha's animated feature "Ice Age" starts ordinarily, then half way through it finds it's voice and says something remarkable about communities or "herds". This is a good surprise, and a welcome one.
"Ice Age" is 20th Century Fox's entry into cutting edge animated feature market. Techincally, it is not on par with some of the Disney or Dreamworks entries, though what makes it promising is that it has a worthwhile story to tell much like "Shrek" and "Monsters Inc." Note that "Shrek" and "Monsters" are better movies. For one thing the story by Michael Wilson and the screenplay by Wilson and Michael Berg wastes time wandering in the first half, without really providing a context for what they really want to say.
Our hero Manny, the Mammoth (voiced by Ray Ramano), is migrating south, though curiously alone. He is suffering over his family from his past. He saves a goofy sloth, Sid (voiced by John Leguizamo) from a curious pair of male Rhinos-- a friend and I "wondered" about the nature of their relationship. The reluctant Manny agrees to take on Sid as a traveling bud.
Along the way Manny and Sid become involved in the dark plot of a Sabertooth Tiger pack to kidnap a human child. Manny rescues the child in the failed attempt, and the child joins their herd. Sabertooth Diego (voiced by the always edgy Denis Leary) is the Judas who joins Manny's herd, pretending to help lead the child back to safely-- he is really following the orders of his leader, the evil Soto (Goran Visnjic). However, Manny saves Diego's life. Diego asks why Manny risked his own life for his. Manny says "... That's what you do when you're part of a herd." Now does Manny trust Diego, who is out to betray him? The "Part of the herd" or this community conversation saves "Ice Age", and offers value. Heroes and leaders can emerge from communities that are very diverse. And these are communities simply because they declared themselves to be--"Our herd". Heroes and leaders emerging unexpectedly from communities are touching and inspiring-- what is cool that it is also expansive. Ultimately, "Ice Age" along with Ramano, Leary, and Leguizamo gets the job done.