Becca Jackaman gives non-frosty coverage to Ice Age 4: Continental Drift…
It’s been three years since the second Ice Age sequel, Dawn of the Dinosaurs, and the writers have put those years to good use. Continental Drift is a breath of fresh air to the franchise, because this time they’ve managed to reach out to not just parents and young children, but teenagers as well, whilst maintaining that cute sense of fun and comedy that has kept the whole thing afloat all this time.
Ice Age 4 Continental Drift
You’ve still got your original characters: Manny the mammoth, Diego the sabre-tooth tiger, Sid the sloth, and – how could we forget – Scrat, who has a significant part to play in the story, as usual. There are also a lot more new characters this time: a motley crew of pirates (Nick Frost provides the voice of an elephant seal, and Jennifer Lopez is Shira, another sabre), and Sid’s sassy Grandma, but the teenage appeal comes from Manny and Ellie’s daughter, Peaches. Many teenagers can identify with her, as she just wants to fit in, feels rather embarrassed about her ‘half-possum, half-mammoth’ family, and wants Ethan (a mammoth voiced by none other than hip-hop rapper, Drake) to notice her. But being the overly-protective father that he is, Manny tries to stop her from doing anything exciting in her life, and they fight…just before the continental shift splits him and his friends up from the family.
This is not the best film from the franchise, but it’s not bad. The pace of the plot seems slow at times, but the continuous flow of one-liners and cheeky humour keeps things going, and the kids will be amused as always, with Scrat and his endless quest for that acorn of his. Come the end of the film, you get the sense that this franchise could just keep on going and going – who knows? It might end up like Saw, and get up to six films before the kids get tired of it.
Listen out for the voices of Nicki Minaj and Glee’s Heather Morris as mammoths.
Rating: 3/5