The story is that the gang’s going to be breaking up now that Manny and Ellie (v. by Ray Romano and Queen Latifah), the woolly mammoths, are going to be having their baby. Diego (v. by Denis Leary) is ready to leave, but Sid the Sloth (v. by John Leguizamo) can’t figure out why they don’t all stay a herd.

When Sid adopts three dino babies of his own, not knowing what they are, of course) the whole crew goes underground and into the land of the dino to rescue him. We get a new character, Buck the Weasel (v. by Simon Pegg) who stole the show with Scrat the Squirrel. The story’s predictable with a lot of warm-hearted fun despite the cold place they are all living in.

All in all, the film was cute. There is enough laughs to carry it through and I definitely see a whole herd of toys and games emerging from this, which is probably why the movie industry is making kid films now anyway. Worth a slow afternoon at matinee prices.

Rebecca Kyle, July 2009
Rating: 3 / 5

When Manny is on the verge of settling down & starting a family, the friendship between the three seems threatened. Diego gets the hint & is ready to take off on his own again, when he realizes he may be to old to go it alone. For Sid, he too, wants a family & as fate would have it, he comes across what looks to be three gigantic, abandoned eggs that when hatched become baby T Rex’s. Of course, mama T Rex comes a calling & its not long before ole Sid is in big trouble & its up to his buddies to bale him out.

The first Ice Age was something new, fresh, funny & had the advantage of being one of the more successfull CG animated films that didn’t come from Disney or Pixar. Ice Age 3 has none of these advantages. There is nothing really new, except a character thats voiced by Simon Pegg who has all the best funny bits (and they are few and far between). The animation is top notch, but, sadly, is now the norm for this type of family film. Ice Age 3 is a decent film for family time, but, I strongly recommend waiting for the DVD release in December.
Rating: 3 / 5

Sid (voiced by John Leguizamo) is a sloth who wants a family. So Sid “adopts” three dinosaur eggs he accidentally found in the icy underground cave. The mother dinosaur is not happy about that, of course, so she takes away three baby dinosaurs AND Sid too back to the cave and further. But where did they go anyway?

Now Sid’s friends – two mammoths in love Manny (Ray Romano) and Elle (Queen Latifah), saber-tooth tiger Diego (Denis Leary), two possums Crash (Seann William Scott) and Eddie (Josh Peck) – they team up and embark on a new adventure into the subterranean world, a colorful computer graphics version of Conan Doyle’s “The Lost World.”

I hate to say this, but it seems none of the four credited writers came up with a good story for “Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs.” The film’s storyline is not just contrived; it is often impossible. Why should pregnant Elle insist on joining the searching party, for instance? The film’s story only proceeds by constantly putting the characters in danger of falling, being eaten or crushed by animals or some objects.

That means there is no one you would like to relate to emotionally. The only character I found interesting is a confirmed loner, Captain Ahab-like weasel Buck (Simon Pegg), whose sole purpose of life is something Manny and Elle would not understand. He alone gives some depth to the film’s weak narrative.

I am not saying everything about “Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs” is dull and uninteresting. The slapstick jokes are funny (including those of Scrat forever wrestling an acorn … I’m beginning to feel sorry for him). These set-pieces are entertaining enough. Only that those sight gags could have been done better somewhere else, with some other characters.
Rating: 3 / 5

The film, which reunites all the main characters from the previous films, is founded on the premise that a handful of dinosaurs survived extinction and made their home beneath the snow-covered earth. How this happened is something the film never bothers to explain, but I guess it doesn’t really matter. What does matter is that Sid the Sloth (voiced by John Leguizamo), Manny the Wooly Mammoth (voiced by Ray Romano), his pregnant wife, Ellie (voiced by Queen Latifah), her possum brothers Crash and Eddie (Seann William Scott and Josh Peck), and Diego the Saber-Tooth Tiger (voiced by Denis Leary) have stumbled onto this hidden world and go on yet another adventure. New to the series is Buck (voiced by Simon Pegg), a weasel left stranded in the dinosaur cave. He has one eye and an Australian accent. If you ever wondered what Steve Irwin would have been like with a mental disorder, now’s your chance to find out.

The plot: Sid, longing for a family of his own, stumbles upon three eggs after falling through a patch of thin ice. He happily claims them as his own–he even draws crude smiley faces on the shells to give them some personality. Only when they hatch does he discover that his “children” are actually T-Rexes. It isn’t long before their real mother ascends and rounds up her children, taking Sid along with her. It’s now up to his friends to enter the dinosaur cave and rescue him. Lo and behold, they’re aided by Buck, a thoroughly insane adventurer with a leaf for an eye patch and a dinosaur tooth for a hunting knife. He’s on a quest for his own version of Moby Dick: A great white dinosaur he has named Rudy.

The main story is occasionally interrupted by comedic vignettes with Scrat the Squirrel, who, of course, is still on a mission to find an acorn. His frenetic escapades have been enhanced for this new movie with the addition of Scratte, a female flying squirrel who’s also in search of an acorn. They’re simultaneously in love and in competition with each other, which is kind of funny but also kind of lame. Scrat’s acorn episodes may have been fun at first, but now they’re just getting old. Think back to the era of the Warner Bros. cartoons: How many Wile E. Coyote shorts does it take to make it clear that (a) he’ll always get hurt by defective Acme products and (b) he’ll never catch the Road Runner? Not too many, I should think. At a certain point, you’re just beating a dead horse.

The humor is periodically tamed, albeit weakly, by more serious plot points. Diego, for example, fears he’s losing his edge, which is why he wants to leave as soon as Manny’s baby is born. Sid is still being hassled for his more annoying tendencies, none of which are helped by the fact that he likes kids so much. Manny is overprotective of Ellie and the baby, so much so that he begins neglecting his friends. All of this is addressed, but they’re hardly developed. This is probably why I didn’t feel much of anything for the characters, certainly not like I did in the first two films. It now seems as if the filmmakers were more interested in perfecting the look, and indeed, the computer imagery and bold color scheme provide great visual appeal (the 3-D doesn’t do much for them, but then again, 3-D itself hasn’t been all that impressive lately).

I’m sure some of you think I’m being too hard on this film, but I’m sorry, I can only suspend disbelief so high before the ropes threaten to buckle. I’ll say this much: If you absolutely must see this film, or if your child is pressing the issue, I recommend you save the extra money and see it in traditional 2-D. Otherwise, you should be in no hurry to get the theater. “Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs” is proof that there can be too much of a good thing; Manny, Sid, Ellie, Diego, and the rest are fun characters, but after two entertaining adventures, they’ve officially overstayed their welcome. It doesn’t help that they’re trapped in a story undeserving of them; when it comes to this kind of cartoon, there’s no way to genuinely be interested in the idea that dinosaurs live underground. Believe me, I tried.
Rating: 3 / 5

When “Ice Age: The Meltdown” came out, there were some points in the making of the film that were almost as clever as the original but could hold more to it. Now with “Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs,” everything loses. And when I mean everything, I literally mean everything.

And with 3-D coming out, oh god, why the hell does 20th Century Fox want to make a movie with 3-D. Oh yeah, to make money out of it. And it’s not worth seeing in 3-D.

“Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs” pick up the events where the previous film, “Ice Age: The Meltdown” left off. Manny and Ellie are about to have a baby. Diego wants to be in a real herd. And Sid wants to have kids so he can be like his friend, Manny. So Sid pilfers some dinosaur eggs. Not only that, winter is on the way. But when the mother dinosaurs ask Sid for her kids, not only does she take the kids, but she also takes Sid.

So Manny, Ellie, Diego, Crash and Eddie go on an adventure to save their troubled, good-for-nothing-of-a-friend sloth, Sid. They meet a friendly but weird acting weasel named Buck. Buck helps them try to find Sid before Manny and Ellie have babies.

I didn’t think “Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs” was a terrible movie, but when you compare it to “The Land Before Time,” “Dinosaur” or even “Jurassic Park,” you get nothing more than a ripoff. I would have to admit that there were moments where the movie was actually pretty cute, but all I can say is that a concept of a dinosaur after the last Ice Age is totally unnecessary.

Well, so what. I could’ve expected a lot worse. Though, I at least liked it more than “The Proposal.”

I have to admit that even with the scenes where Scrat and Scratte goes on their quest for the perfect nut, it gets kind of annoying at times. But yeah, so what. Yes, I could have expected a lot better but at the same time, I could’ve expected so much worse.

OK. You want to know my whole point. If you like the first two “Ice Age” films and want to see it, fine, go right ahead. Your kids will enjoy this, but don’t expect anything near or like to the first two films. For a film in reality, compare to any other type of movie, it wasn’t as bad as “Quantum of Solace,” but it doesn’t hold off to the Pixar films. But for an animation film, it’s way better than “The Tale of Despereaux.”
Rating: 2 / 5