Ice Age is a 2002 American computer-animated comedy adventure film directed by Carlos Saldanha and Chris Wedge from a story by Michael J. Wilson. It was produced by Blue Sky Studios and distributed by 20th Century Fox. The film features the voices of Ray Romano, John Leguizamo, Denis Leary and Chris Wedge and was nominated at the 75th Academy Awards for best animated feature. It shows the adventures of a sloth named Sid, a mammoth named Manny and a few other animals when the Earth was being flooded with glaciers.
This film was met with mostly positive reviews and was a box office success by grossing over $383 million, starting the Ice Age franchise. It was followed by three sequels, including Ice Age: The Meltdown in 2006, Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs in 2009, and Ice Age: Continental Drift in 2012. A fifth film, Ice Age: Collision Course was released on July 22, 2016.
Plot
| Spoiler Warning: The following contains important plot details of the entire film. |
A saber-toothed squirrel (known as Scrat) is trying to find a place to store his prized acorn. Eventually, as he tries to stomp it into the ground, he causes a large crack in the ground that extends for miles and miles and sets off a large avalanche. He barely escapes, but finds himself stepped on by a herd of prehistoric animals. The animals are trying to avoid the ice age by migrating south. Sid, a clumsy ground sloth left behind by his family, decides to move on by himself but is attacked by two Brontops whom he angered. Sid is soon saved by Manfred ("Manny"), an agitated mammoth who fights them off and is heading north. Not wanting to be alone and unprotected, Sid follows Manny. Meanwhile, Soto, the leader of a Smilodon pride, wants revenge on a group of humans by eating the chief's baby son, Roshan, alive. Soto leads a raid on the human camp, during which Roshan's mother is separated from the rest and jumps down a waterfall when cornered by Soto's lieutenant, Diego. For his failure, Diego is sent to find and retrieve the baby.
Later, Sid and Manny spot Roshan and his mother near the lake, having survived her plunge. The mother only has enough strength to trust her baby to Manny before she disappears. After much persuasion by Sid, they decide to return Roshan, but when they reach the human settlement, they find it deserted. They meet up with Diego, who convinces the pair to let him help by tracking the humans. The six travel on, with Diego secretly leading them to his pack for an ambush.
While having small adventures on their way, they reach a cave with several drawings made by humans. There Sid and Diego learn about Manny's past and his previous interactions with the human hunters, in which his wife and son were killed, leaving Manny a cynical loner. Later, Manny, Sid, Diego and Roshan almost reach Half-Peak but encounter a river of lava. Manny and Sid, along with Roshan, make it safely, but Diego struggles, about to fall into the lava. Manny rescues him, narrowly missing a fall into the lava himself. The herd takes a break for the night, and Roshan takes his first walking steps to Diego.
The next day, the herd approach the ambush, causing Diego to confess to Manny and Sid about the ambush, and he tells them to trust him. The herd battles Soto's pack, and a short fight ensues. As Soto closes in for the kill on Manny, Diego leaps and stops Soto, who wounds Diego in the process. Manny knocks Soto into a rock wall, causing several sharp icicles to fall on Soto, killing him. The rest of the pack then retreats. The group then mourns for the injury caused to Diego. Soon, Manny and Sid manage to return the baby to his tribe, and Diego rejoins them, as the group begins to head off to warmer climates.
20,000 years later, Scrat, frozen in the ice, ends up on the shores of a tropical island. When the ice slowly melts, the acorn is then washed away. He mistakenly triggers a volcanic eruption, while stomping the coconut into the ground.
| Spoiler Warning: All spoilers have been stated and have ended here. |
Similarities Used
- Tongue Stuck
- Adventure Ride
Cast
The characters are all prehistoric animals. The animals can talk to and understand each other and are voiced by a variety of famous actors. Like many films of prehistoric life, the rules of time periods apply very loosely, as many of the species shown in the film never actually lived in the same time periods or the same geographic regions.
- Manfred "Manny", a woolly mammoth, is voiced by Ray Romano
- Diego, a Smilodon, is voiced by Denis Leary
- Sid, a giant ground sloth, is voiced by John Leguizamo
- Scrat, a "saber-toothed" squirrel, is voiced by Chris Wedge
- Soto, a Smilodon, is voiced by Goran Višnjić
- Zeke, a Smilodon, is voiced by Jack Black
- Oscar, a Smilodon, is voiced by Diedrich Bader
- Lenny, a Homotherium, is voiced by Alan Tudyk
- Carl, a Brontops, is voiced by Cedric the Entertainer
- Frank, a Brontops, is voiced by Stephen Root
- Rachel, a female giant ground sloth, is voiced by Jane Krakowski
- Jennifer, a female giant ground sloth, is voiced by Lorri Bagley