Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs is a 2009 American animated adventure comedy film produced by Blue Sky Studios and distributed by 20th Century Fox. It is the sequel to Ice Age: The Meltdown (2006) and the third installment in the Ice Age film series. It was directed by Carlos Saldanha and co-directed by Mike Thurmeier (in his feature directorial debut), from a screenplay written by Michael Berg, Peter Ackerman, Mike Reiss, and Yoni Brenner, based on a story conceived by Jason Carter Eaton. Ray Romano, John Leguizamo, Denis Leary, and Chris Wedge reprise their roles from the first two films and Seann William Scott, Josh Peck, and Queen Latifah reprise their roles from The Meltdown, with Simon Pegg joining them in the role of a weasel named Buck. The story has Manny and Ellie preparing for their baby. Sid the Sloth is kidnapped by a female Tyrannosaurus after stealing her eggs, leading the rest of the herd to rescue him in a tropical lost world inhabited by dinosaurs underneath the ice.
The film was released on July 1, 2009, becoming the first Ice Age film and the first 20th Century Fox film to be released in 3D. It received mixed reviews from critics, and has grossed $886.7 million worldwide, making it the third-highest-grossing film of 2009, the highest-grossing animated film of 2009, the highest-grossing Ice Age film and the highest-grossing film from Blue Sky Studios. Two sequels, Ice Age: Continental Drift and Ice Age: Collision Course, were released in 2012 and 2016, respectively.
== Plot ==
Ellie is pregnant, making Manny desperate to make life perfect and safe for both her and their upcoming child, not wanting them to meet the same fate as his previous wife and child. However, this causes him to alienate Diego, who is contemplating leaving the herd as he feels like he's losing his edge as a hunter and isn't meant for family life, and Sid, who begins to wish for a family of his own. Sid discovers an underground icy cave, where he finds three apparently abandoned eggs, and decides to adopt them. Manny tells Sid to put the eggs back, but Sid ignores him and looks after them, which hatch into baby Tyrannosaurus the next morning. Meanwhile, Scrat becomes infatuated with a flying saber-tooth squirrel named Scratte, though she only wants his acorn.
Although Sid tries his best to raise the dinosaurs, their rambunctious behavior scares away all the younger animals, and they destroy the playground Manny built for his child, angering Manny. The mother Tyrannosaurus whose eggs Sid took arrives, looking for the eggs. When Sid refuses to return the babies, she carries both Sid and her children underground. Manny, Ellie, Diego, Crash, and Eddie follow them, and discover that the icy cave leads to a vast subterranean jungle populated by dinosaurs thought to be extinct. They are surrounded by dinosaurs, but saved by a deranged one-eyed least weasel named Buck.
Buck reveals that he's lived in the jungle for a long time and has been hunting down Rudy, a large and hostile albino Baryonyx feared by the inhabitants of the jungle. He agrees to lead the group through the jungle's perils to Lava Falls, where the mother dinosaur has taken Sid and her babies. Meanwhile, the mother Tyrannosaurus tries to get rid of Sid as revenge for stealing her children, but eventually, she slowly grows attached to him. The next day, however, Sid is separated from the Tyrannosaurus family and is attacked by Rudy. He outruns him, but gets stranded on a loose rock that is floating on a river of lava and about to plummet over the falls.
As the herd moves toward the lava falls, Ellie goes into labor and a pack of Guanlong attack them, causing a rock slide that separates her from the rest. Buck, Crash, and Eddie set out to rescue Sid while Manny and Diego stay behind to protect Ellie. Diego regains his edge by protecting Ellie from the Guanlong while also supporting her emotionally as she gives birth. Manny slows down the rest as he makes his way up to her.
Meanwhile, just as Sid goes over the falls, Buck, Crash, and Eddie swoop in on a commandeered Harpactognathus, narrowly saving Sid after escaping a pack of Quetzalcoatlus. Manny reaches Ellie just in time to see his newborn daughter, and the couple agree to name the baby "Peaches". Sid is happy to reunite with his friends, but is sad that he never had a chance to say goodbye to the dinosaurs.
Before they can leave the jungle, they are ambushed by Rudy. The herd is saved by the mother Tyrannosaurus, who charges at Rudy and knocks him off a cliff. Sid then says goodbye to the dinosaurs. 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. Because of this, he changes his mind and sends the herd home, blocking off the path to the underground jungle at the same time. Manny and Ellie welcome Peaches into their frozen world, and Diego decides to remain with the herd, while Buck stays underground, having managed to tame Rudy. Scrat and Scratte decide to live in the jungle together, but Scratte suddenly becomes bossy and Scrat ultimately chooses the acorn over her. Scratte catches him and takes away the acorn, causing a fight. Scrat is accidentally launched back to the surface, where he once again loses the acorn after a large piece of ice knocks it out of his hand, trapping both the acorn and Scratte in the dinosaur world, much to his frustration.
== Production ==
Blue Sky decided to do "more of a what-if adventure" in the third Ice Age installment, "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.
== Release ==
Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs held special screenings on Father's Day, June 21, 2009, in 330 theaters across the United States, exclusively in 3-D. That day was chosen due to the film featuring a theme of fatherhood. Widely, it was released on July 1, 2009.
The film was released in RealD 3D where available. This sparked some controversy when Fox announced that it would no longer pay to supply 3-D glasses to theaters, leading to a number of exhibitors threatening to show the film in only standard 2-D projection.
=== Home media ===
Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs was released on standard DVD and high-definition Blu-ray Disc in North America on October 27, 2009. Two versions of the DVD were released: a single-disc DVD, and a "Scrat Pack" double DVD pack with three Scrat games. The 3-disc Blu-ray combo pack included a Blu-ray, the single-disc DVD, and a Digital Copy, as well as an Ice Age digital story-book maker, commentary by director Carlos Saldanha, deleted scenes, making-of featurettes, the two Scrat shorts: Gone Nutty and No Time for Nuts (that each originally came on home video for both the first and second films), and a how-to-draw Scrat tutorial with the filmmakers.
A Blu-ray 3D version of the film was exclusively available with purchase of select Panasonic's television sets between May 16 and July 10, 2010, and was widely released on August 30, 2010. On September 21, 2010, a 3-D DVD was released as a two-disc set, with the first disc being the TrioScopics 3-D (green-magenta anaglyph) version and the second disc being the 2-D version.
== Reception ==
=== Box office ===
The film earned $196.6 million in North America and $690.1 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $886.7 million against a budget of $90 million. Worldwide, it is the third-highest-grossing film of 2009, the highest-grossing animated film of 2009, the highest-grossing Ice Age film, the 14th-highest-grossing animated film of all time. It is also the highest-grossing animated film of 2009 worldwide. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs also surpassed Finding Nemo to have the highest international gross for an animated film. The film grossed $218.4 million during the opening weekend, and was the highest-grossing opening for an animated film. It would hold that record for less than a decade until it was surpassed by Incredibles 2 in 2018.
==== North America ====
The film made $13,791,157 on its opening day in 4,099 theaters. It reached $41,690,382 on its first weekend, putting it at number 2 behind Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, marking the lowest-grossing first weekend for the franchise, although it had a Wednesday release and therefore burned off attendance until the weekend. The film became 20th Century Fox's third-largest 2009 release in North America, behind Avatar and Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel. It is the third-highest-grossing animated feature of 2009. It heavily out-grossed its predecessor, Ice Age: The Meltdown which earned $195,330,621 three years before, to become the highest-grossing movie in the franchise, but it was behind the two first Ice Age movies in estimated attendance.
==== Other territories ====
On its opening weekend it earned $151.7 million, which is the biggest opening for an animated feature. Its highest-grossing market after North America was Germany ($82.2 million), followed by France and the Maghreb region ($69.2 million), and the UK, Ireland and Malta ($56.9 million). It was the highest-grossing animated film of the year in all major countries, except Spain and Australia.
=== Critical response ===
On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 46% based on 165 reviews and an average rating of 5.4/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs boasts some excellent animation -- in particular, the dinosaurs are wonderfully realized -- but its story is tired and monotonous." On Metacritic, the film has a score of 50 out of 100 based on 25 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A−" on an A+ to F scale.
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." 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." James Dyer of Empire gave the film three out of five stars, calling it a "pacey, enjoyable yarn for the most part" and praise Pegg's performance, stating "Long-in-the-tooth characters detract from the usual high-spirited fun and frolics."
Phillip French of The Guardian was critical of the film's crude humor and felt that "most adults will find it...too long". Also writing for The Guardian, Ben Child wrote that he found the film predictable, and despite praising the Scrat subplot, felt "there were precious few laughs and no real feeling that anyone aside from the animation team was really pushing themselves. You can pretty much tell exactly what's going to happen, and what each character is about to say...I actually found myself almost drifting off at one point." Richard Propes offered a negative review, considering the film to be the worst in the series and though in praise of the animation, was critical of the characters and storyline, feeling it "never come to life and never become involving." TheScoreCard gave the film 3 out of 10 stars and wrote "... the voice talents aren’t as popular as they were originally in 2002...the moments when it can use new character Buck or seasoned silent film star Scrat to keep audiences interested. As zany as Simon Pegg’s voicing is of the wacko weasel, and as timeless as Scrat’s existence may be, no two characters alone can save this threequel from being a weak moment for animated storytelling. They certainly can’t make another Ice Age movie entirely worth it".
Some criticism has been directed at its ending to the Scrat sub plot in which Scrat loses both the acorn and Scratte after a fight. Drew Friday criticises the "played for laughs but comes across as mean-spirted, 'Scrat abandons his desires for love, and for a time he is happy and unpunished. But the pull of the acorn proves too much for him to resist, and he turns his back on love. And he is punished", arguing that it is made more frustrating by the fact that Scratte never made another appearance in the series: "Cut the final few minutes from 'Dawn of the dinosaurs' and imagine what a finale that would have been!"
=== Accolades ===
The film was nominated in two categories at the 8th Visual Effects Society Awards, for "Outstanding Animation in an Animated Feature Motion Picture" and "Outstanding Animated Character in an Animated Feature Motion Picture."
== Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs - The 4-D Experience ==
Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs - The 4-D Experience is a 14-minute 4-D film shown at various 4-D theaters over the world. It retells the condensed story of Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs with the help of 3-D projection and sensory effects, including moving seats, wind, mist, snow and scents. Produced by SimEx-Iwerks, The 4-D Experience premiered in May 2012, at the San Diego Zoo 4-D Theater. Since June 2012, it is being shown at the Roxy Theatre, at the Warner Bros. Movie World in Australia, and since July 2012, at the Shedd Aquarium's Phelps Auditorium in Chicago.
== Video game ==
Main article: Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (video game)
A tie-in video game was published by Activision. The game allows players to play as one of the film's characters, discovering the underground world of dinosaurs and solving puzzles through more than 15 levels.
== Sequels ==
Main article: Ice Age (franchise)
A fourth film, Ice Age: Continental Drift, was released in 3D on July 13, 2012. A fifth film, Ice Age: Collision Course, was released in 3D on July 22, 2016.
== Trivia ==
* This movie erased the fact about T-Rex as the main antagonist for all Dino movies.
* A preview of this film was shown on the DVD of Horton Hears a Who.
* This is the first Blue Sky Studios film to feature Bill Hader.
* This is the first Ice Age film to be released in not to be released in March.
* This is the only Ice Age film to start with Scrat not doing anything with his acorn.
* Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs is the fourth Blue Sky Studios film to have a non–human cast, after Robots, Ice Age: The Meltdown and Horton Hears a Who!.
* The last Blue Sky Studios film to be produced in a 1.85:1 aspect ratio, until The Peanuts Movie. This is also the last Ice Age film to be produced in a 1.85:1 aspect ratio.
* This is the last Ice Age film directed by Carlos Saldanha.
* The second film had Manny mention that the dinosaurs went extinct, and in this one Ellie repeats that, meaning that somehow the animals knew about the existence of dinosaurs on earth, even though that was millions of years before the films take place, and animals don't have paleontology tools.
* Throughout the movie there is sunlight in the Dinosaur Valley, and when Buck tells the story of when he fought Rudy there is rain and lightning. The light could have been the sunlight from the surface magnified by the ice, and the rain could have been melting ice.
* Also, Buck seems to to have gone insane, and put the lightning in for dramatic effect.
* It is also possible that the rain forest that the dinosaurs live in could have created its own atmosphere.
* Sid finds the Tyrannosaurus rex's eggs in an ice cave. No egg could survive in such a cold environment without a constant source body heat from the parent.
* Also, there is a considerable distance between the cavern and the Dinosaur World entrance, which leaves it unclear why Momma left the eggs so far.
* When everyone except Buck is asleep, Ellie is shown next to Manny, even holding trunks with him by the looks of it. However, when Manny wakes from his nightmare, Ellie is a good distance away from him, around twenty feet.
* Based on the snout shape of Baryonyx, scientists claim that it would rather eat fish rather than mammals.
* When Sid tossed an Archaeopteryx off a cliff and expected it to fly, the Archaeopteryx plummeted to the ground instead until it got eaten by a Pteranodon. It seems odd that the Archaeopteryx seemed unable to fly since it is a bird that has wings that are built for flying.
* This is the first Blue Sky Studios film that wasn't released in March.
* This is the first Ice Age movie that doesn't end with Manny giving Sid a ride on his back, or having the herd walk into the sunset.
* This isn't the first time dinosaurs were featured in the franchise. In the first film, Sid actually once saw a frozen T. Rex while the original trio were venturing in an icy cave.
* Fast Tony is the only character from the second film that don't appear in the third film.
* Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs is possibly set at least two years after the events of the second film, this is based on the fact that Ellie's pregnancy lasted around a normal elephant's, and that she is close to giving birth at the start of the movie.
* The 20th Century Fox logo featured in the theatrical version was retained in the Blu-ray 3D and TrioScopics 3D DVD releases and may be retained in the TV release of the film.
* It took only 26 days approximately to fetch $670 million and overcome its predecessor Ice Age: The Meltdown.
* This is the first film in the Ice Age series not to be released in March.
** It's also the first film in the Ice Age series to be released in July.
** It is the first (so far), and only Blue Sky Studios film that has become a trilogy.
* This is the last Blue Sky Studios film to use the 1994 20th Century Fox logo.
Category:Adventure
Category:Comedy
Category:Ice Age
Category:20th Century Fox
Category:Blue Sky Studios
Category:Animated Films
Category:Animation
Category:2009
Category:July