Ice Age: The Meltdown, also known as Ice Age 2: The Meltdown or simply as Ice Age 2, is the 2006 film sequel to the computer-animated 2002 film Ice Age. It was produced by Blue Sky Studios for 20th Century Fox, and premiered in Belgium and the Philippines on March 29, 2006. It was eventually released in 70 countries, with the last release being in China, on June 9, 2006.[2] It was directed by Carlos Saldanha, co-director of the original Ice Age, and the music is done by Robots composer, John Powell.This film was originally rated G by the MPAA, but was re-rated PG by the MPAA for some mild language and innuendo. The working title was Ice Age 2: The Meltdown, but for the movie's final release, the creators decided to remove the number 2, calling it Ice Age: The Meltdown. However, in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Mexico, and Australia, its title is promoted as Ice Age 2: The Meltdown. Also, most of the sponsors of the movie had the 2 in their packaging after the name change (they however did edit the 2 out of their TV ads).The Blu-ray Disc and DVD were released in the United States and Canada on November 21, 2006 according to the official web store.[3] It was released in Mexico and Latin America in mid-June 2006 and released in the UK on October 23, 2006. They both include a brand new Scrat short, No Time for Nuts.
Plot
In the opening scene, Scrat, the saber-toothed squirrel climbs a glacier but accidentally opens a hole in it. The world of ice is slowly melting. The creatures of the Ice Age are all shown enjoying themselves on slides and pools made by the melting ice; among them the three protagonists of the first film: Manfred, Sid, and Diego. Sid opens a day camp, where none of the younger creatures take him seriously, nor do Manfred and Diego, which leaves Sid seeking a daring deed. Fast Tony , a local con artist is claiming that the earth will flood and that the bark and reeds which he sells are needed to stay alive. Manfred dismisses the idea, but is distracted when he sees that Sid will try to high dive from a giant waterfall; as Manfred goes with Diego to the top of the waterfall to save Sid from his act of daredevilry, they see that the pleasant weather caused the ice of the valley to melt, and it is kept from destroying the valley only by the glaciers, which have formed a dam. As the animals begin their journey, Sid sings three songs to tease Manny about Mammoths being "extinct". A turkey vulture tells the animals that a giant tree can act as a boat and save them; all soon set out to find it. During the time that the masses of animals escape, a glacier which contains two sea reptiles from the Mesozoic era, (Cretaceous and Maelstrom), breaks off.
Manfred is teased about being the last mammoth alive, but meets Ellie, a female mammoth who believes she is an opossum and the sister of Crash and Eddie. Sid invites her to tag along with the group to escape the flood, and she brings her brothers. After a perilous ordeal with Cretaceous and Maelstrom, Sid finds out that Diego is afraid of water. They discover an area which Ellie recalls as the place where she was adopted. She finally realizes she is a mammoth but distances herself from Manny when he suggests "saving their species". Sid is kidnapped by a tribe of mini-sloths who believe Sid to be a god. Sid lights a fire for them, and believes that he has finally found respect, but they plan to sacrifice him to a volcano. Sid escapes. The next morning Sid tells them his experience but none are convinced. They find a field of hot geysers, which separate Manfred, Sid, and Diego from Ellie and her brothers.
When the flood comes, Manfred saves Ellie from drowning as she is caught in some rocks, while Diego overcomes his fear of water to save Sid. Cretaceous and Maelstrom arrive, but due to Manfred's quick thinking, they are finished off by a rock which falls on them, killing them both. The other animals are at the mercy of the water currents. Meanwhile Scrat climbs up the glacier and at the top sticks the acorn he has into the ice. This forms a crack in the glacier, which widens into a fissure, diverting the flood and saving the animals. Scrat is then washed away. In the final scene, a herd of mammoths shows up, but Manny and Ellie decide to remain together anyway, taking Sid, Diego, and the opossum brothers along. The epilogue shows Scrat having a near death experience after falling into the fissure. He enters a heaven full of acorns. Suddenly, he finds himself torn away. He unhappily wakes up, having been resuscitated by Sid.
Characters
- Manfred "Manny" the woolly mammoth, played by Ray Romano
- Sid the ground sloth, played by John Leguizamo
- Diego the Smilodon, played by Denis Leary
- Scrat the saber-toothed squirrel, played by Chris Wedge
- Ellie the woolly mammoth, played by Queen Latifah
- Crash and Eddie the opossums, played by Seann William Scott and Josh Peck respectively
- Fast Tony the giant armadillo, played by Jay Leno
- Stu the glyptodont, played by Tom Fahn
- James the aardvark, played by Alex Sullivan
- Cholly the Chalicothere, played by Alan Tudyk
- Lone Gunslinger, played by Will Arnett
Promotions
- As an additional marketing ploy a special "anti-cell" spot was created with Sid complaining to the audience about a ringing cellular phone. The same was done for Brother Bear, I, Robot, Kung Fu Panda, and Robots (another Blue Sky Studios film).
- On Family Guy's episode "Sibling Rivalry", Scrat is shown trying to take three nuts out of a side of a glacier; Peter shows up and tries to stop him, admonishing the squirrel for stealing, which drives Scrat to subsequently attack Peter. Apart from Peter, the scene was rendered in 3D (Family Guy is normally drawn in 2D), and Scrat was voiced by Chris Wedge who voices him in the films. The episode originally aired the week before the film opened. Fox aired promotions for the movie throughout the evening.
- During the same evening of Scrat's Family Guy cameo, Sid was hosting the entire FOX line-up, showing up in intermittent times between commercials.
- A teaser trailer for The Simpsons Movie was attached to every print of the movie, despite rumors that it was only on some prints.
- Re-edited scenes of Ice Age: The Meltdown were shown in Airhead candy commercials on several kids' channels and programs, such as the Disney Channel, Nickelodeon, ABC Kids on ABC, and more. It shows, in part, that after Scrat defeats a school of piranha, he proudly displays an Airhead packet (replaced by an acorn in the actual movie), when suddenly an eagle comes over and swipes it from him.
- One of the posters for the film was a parody of an iPod advertisement, with "iAge" replacing "iPod" and an acorn replacing an iPod. The poster can be viewed at [1].
Reception
Critical reception
Ice Age: The Meltdown opened on March 31, 2006 to mixed reviews, with Rotten Tomatoes giving the film a "fresh" rating, with 56% of reviews positive. Its Metacritic score is 58 [2], placing it at the high end of the site's "mixed or average reviews" category. Roger Ebert gave the film two-and-a-half stars out of four.[3]
Box office
The film exceeded expectations by opening with an $68,033,544 in its first weekend. This was the second biggest opening for a non-summer, non-holiday release, after the $83,848,082 of the The Passion of the Christ. But the record for highest grossing weekend for March only lasted a year, due to the $70,885,301 weekend of 300. The film grossed a total of $195,330,621 at United States and Canadian box offices, making it the first movie in 2006 to pass the $100 million mark.
In the Netherlands, the film grossed €152,262 in its first week, not enough to enter the top 10. In its second week (March 30 - April 5), the film moved up to #1, grossing €1,350,375, kicking Inside Man from its #1 position there. The film has accomplished an amazing job by remaining in the top 3 for 9 weeks. In total, the film grossed € 6,108,685 in the Netherlands. As of January 12, 2007, the film grossed a massive $651,564,512 worldwide according to Box Office Mojo, surpassing all expectations and netting the film a massive profit given the moderate budget of $80 million. At time of writing, it holds the 33rd spot on the list of highest-grossing films.
Soundtrack
The score is by John Powell; the soundtrack also features the song "Food Glorious Food" from the musical and film Oliver!. He composes brand new music for the film that replaced the theme songs from the previous film. Aram Khachaturyan's Adagio from Spartacus is featured during Scrat's Heavenly vision.
Sequel
According to Box Office Mojo, an Ice Age 3 is in the works, with a planned release date of July 4, 2009, titled Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs[4]. The teaser trailer was attached to the film Horton Hears a Who.
Video game
A video and computer game based on the film was developed and published by Vivendi Games, and the Wii version was released shortly after the launch of the system.
Plot
In this game, Scrat is caught up in the events of the film, Ice Age: The Meltdown and is trying to pursue acorns while interacting with some characters, some of whom help him in his quest. The game starts off by showing the icy areas where it began in the film and moving on to the woods, as well as exploring regions in the games such as the bowels of the sea reptile, Maelstrom, and swampy lands. In the game, Scrat occasionally allies himself with some of the main characters, and the player sometimes can play as either Sid or Diego, though not Manny. Characters which were shown as bit parts in the film are shown usually as adversaries or (in the case of one, a songbird) a guide to the next nut, though a select number of foes were not shown in the film at all.
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It has its moments, but overall it's vapid
Oh dear, what went wrong? I remember watching Ice Age, and being
dtgonehome from United States - 9 June 2009endlessly entertained, exceedingly satisfied and just filled with mirth
and warmness; it was such a lovable, charming and magical little film,
and watching it was a joy. Now here comes its sequel, which instead of
focusing on the zenith of the ice age instead focuses on its demise.
Apart from that, the characters are the same, the humour is relatively
identical and there really isn't anything else significantly different.
But I'm afraid when I watched Ice Age: The Meltdown, I didn't feel
satisfaction, mirth or warmness, albeit being mildly entertained. I
felt indifferent, apathetic and generally uninterested in the 'gang's'
latest escapades.Well after the end credits have rolled, I still have no idea what
caused this disastrous screening. In the first film, everything just
seemed to click. Now, it's quite the opposite. The story wasn't
anywhere near as charming or funny anymore; instead, it was vapid,
contrived and to be frank, lame. The characters were nowhere near as
lovable or endearing, but now were just tiresome, repetitive and
monotonous. Yes, actually I think I do no what happened to the Ice Age
franchise, and I think do know the root of its seemingly premature and
sudden demise.It's the same thing that happens to all sequels, and that's that the
sequel is nearly always inferior. The extent of inferiority varies for
each film, and unfortunately that extent is rather substantial for this
film. Ice Age 2 is substantially inferior in practically every field –
the story, the characters, the script, etc – and as a result the final
product is nowhere near as satisfying as we would like. It's a major
disappointment to say the least, and is a perfect example of a
substandard animation film of today's day and age.One of the things I least expected was not to love the same trio of
characters which were just so fun and amusing in the first film but are
now repetituous and tiresome. They were: Sid (John Leguizamo), a
talkative sloth who's surprisingly managed to be less irritating this
time around but more lovable; Manny (Ray Romano), a giant mammoth and
former misanthrope who is now angry about his species' extinction
rather than the animal kingdom as a whole'; and Diego (Dennis Leary), a
Sabretooth tiger who now faces a new problem in this film after
conquering his last one previously; where in the original Ice Age Diego
was torn between good and evil, he's now caught up with his phobia of
water, which I believe is professionally known as aquaphobia.This is just one of the myriad of subplots in the film, intertwined in
the film's main story. Just like the first film, the trio are on a long
and arduous journey through their colourful land, but this time the
entire population of the valley is tagging along; plus, their journey
isn't a voluntary moral duty but one which their life depends on.
Global warming has hit the planet and the ice age is in its final
moments, and all the ice is melting. Manny, Diego and Sid must head to
the end of the valley where an 'ark' is awaiting them (this biblical
reference seems just like any other pop culture reference). On their
way, they run through dangerous geyser fields, battle resurrected and
hungry sea monsters, encounter a pesky pair of badgers (claiming Sid's
title as the most annoying thing in the film) and are even treated to a
choreographed musical sequence of a pack of eagles singing 'Food,
Glorious Food'.And of course, Scrat makes a triumphant return in Ice Age: Meltdown,
and what's new with him? Absolutely nothing. He's exactly the same,
just as all the other characters, and he's still going after that
elusive acorn as if his life depended on it. However, out of this comes
something quite remarkable; Scrat emerges as the only character in the
film who consistently entertains us, and constantly keeps us amused
amidst all the repetition and monotony everywhere else. He seems to be
the only character in this sequel who retains any magic, and he
essentially saves the film from becoming a total and utter failure.Instead, it's only a mild failure, albeit still being one. I can't say
I recommend Ice Age: The Meltdown, not even to children. There are
scenes in the film that are reminiscent to Steven Spielberg's Jaws,
involving sadistic and ominous sea monsters leaping from the depths and
devouring anyone who inadvertently and mistakenly wanders too close to
the shore. The humour, for the most part, is toilet humour which is for
the most part hit-and-miss. And of course, the biggest problem with the
film is that it's vapid, it's uninteresting and monotonous in its
dealings, and is really a rehash of the original film with a new story,
one that clearly had the intention of having relevance in today's
current affairs. However, Ice Age: The Meltdown is not so much an
educational or moral film as it is an entertaining one, or even a
successful one at that.
Ice Age 2: The Meltdown
Ice Age 2: The Meltdown is the sequel to 2002's Ice Age, an animated
gameking53 from United Kingdom - 31 May 2009blockbuster released by Blue Sky Studios starring the voice talents of
Ray Romano, John Leguizamo and Denis Leary. The movie involved a woolly
mammoth named Manfred, a sloth named Sid and a sabre toothed tiger
named Diego coming together and attempting to return a human baby to
it's tribe.Ice Age 2: The Meltdown involves Manny, Sid and Diego and their new
herd trying to escape the valley due to an ice meltdown, which will
cause the entire valley to flood. Along the way, they meet Ellie,
another woolly mammoth who believes she is a possum and the sister of
opossums Eddie and Crash.The sequel is directed by Carlos Saldanha, who appears to have a vastly
different directing style than Chris Wedge (voice of Scrat and director
of the original movie). Carlos has gone for a lot of cheesy humour
which was not present in the original, and completely changes the
personality of Manfred. Instead of being moody and quiet, Manny is now
quite talkative, humorous and silly in areas. Ice Age 2 also sneaks in
a few "mature" words like damn, crap and ass, which was unnecessary and
only adds to the cringing humour.The short scenes with Scrat are still as hilarious as ever. Whilst I
believe he was funnier in the first movie, Ice Age 2 boasts more scenes
with the funny rodent, all of which see him perform insane stunts to
try and recover his beloved acorn (even beating up a swarm of
piranhas). It would be nice if a few more scenes were squished in, but
for the most part Scrat is still his hilarious self.The animation is impressive. Sure, the fur effects are lacking in
areas, but the lighting, water and soft look of the landscapes are
brilliantly done and lovely to gaze upon. The characters are animated
well and don't feel stiff, and the animation overall is very good.Overall, Ice Age 2: The Meltdown is a fun and enjoyable animated
comedy, with some nice characters and some new voice talents (Queen
Latifah, Sean William Scott, Josh Peck). However, it's style of humour
is much more corny than the first movie, and the plot is not the best
in an animated film. In conclusion, the movie is decent and fun.
A great little icebreaker.
The unlikely "herd" from the first movie (Manny The Mammoth, Sid The
tyler-and-jack from Edinburgh. - 4 March 2009Sloth and Diego The Sabre-Toothed Tiger) return in this enjoyable and
entertaining sequel.This time around, the ice is melting (hence the title) and our leads
have to leave their valley in double quick time to hopefully stay ahead
of an impending flood. On their travels they bump into Ellie, a woolly
mammoth who thinks she's a possum (voiced by Queen Latifah), and her
two "brothers" who actually ARE possums. Having not seen any other
mammoths in some time, Manny can only hope that Ellie eventually
realises what species she really is so that extinction can be delayed
for them both.With the same stylised look and wonderfully crafted script this is that
rare beast indeed, a sequel that is very much the equal of it's
predecessor. And that is helped in no small part by the return of
nut-crazy Scrat, the lovely little guy who grows increasingly mad and
desperate as fate continually thwarts his best efforts to get his hands
on some tasty nutty goodness.See this if you like: Ice Age, Robots, Happy Feet.
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