Ice Age 4: Continental Drift (2012)

Ice Age: Continental Drift, also known internationally as Ice Age 4: Continental Drift or simply as Ice Age 4, is a 2012 American 3-D computer-animated adventure/comedy film directed by Steve Martino and Mike Thurmeier. It was written by Jason Fuchs and Michael Berg, and features the voices of Ray Romano, John Leguizamo, Denis Leary, Nicki Minaj, Drake, Jennifer Lopez, Keke Palmer and Queen Latifah.

It is the fourth and final installment of the Ice Age series, produced by Blue Sky Studios and distributed by 20th Century Fox. It is the first sequel in the series not directed by Carlos Saldanha,[4] and the second Ice Age installment that utilises Digital 3D. It was released in the US on July 13, 2012, three to six years after its predecessors The Meltdown and Dawn of the Dinosaurs, and ten years after the release of the original Ice Age. This was the first Ice Age film to be shot in the 2.39:1 aspect ratio.

Despite receiving mixed reviews from critics, the film became a box office hit, with a worldwide gross of $872 million.

Plot

Manny becomes over-protective about his teenage daughter, Peaches, going to the falls to see a teenage mammoth named Ethan. Meanwhile, Sid reunites with his family (who abandoned him during the first film), but is abandoned again, with his obnoxious Granny. Manny catches Peaches with Louis heading to the falls; he finds her with Ethan and Manny embarrasses Peaches in front of her friends. Soon after, the separation of the continents separates Manny from his family. Manny gets stuck on a floating iceberg with Sid and Diego and a large moving landmass drives Ellie, Peaches, and a herd of other animals towards a land bridge, where Manny had told them to go.

After the herd herd survived a rough storm, they find Granny in a tree on the same iceberg. Later the herd encounters an ice ship, and discover that there are a group of animal pirates, led by a Gigantopithecus named Captain Gutt along with his first mate, a female smilodon named Shira. Gutt and the pirate gang attempt to get the herd to join their crew, but they refuse, prompting Gutt to hold them as hostages. Gutt then attempts to make them "walk the plank" with narwhals swimming underneath the edge, but they manage to escape, breaking the pirate ship in the process. Gutt and the pirates survive the incident and is seen floating on their half of the broken ship. Some of the pirates are concerned over Shira's whereabouts, but Gutt leaves her for dead. Meanwhile, Shira, lost at sea, gets rescued by the herd on there half of the broken ship.

The herd reaches an island and they find a way home, and the pirates, leading to forcing some hyraxes to steal Gutt's ship. The next morning, the herd and the hyraxes' plot to steal the ship and free the captive hyraxes is prepared. Shira later escapes and rejoins the pirates, but finds herself being berated and called a failure by Gutt for not trying to kill the herd, as he relieves her of her position while giving it to Squint as punishment. Diego is captured by Shira, but tells her to join the herd, and so Shira helps the herd to escape and the hyraxes left freely. Gutt who is furious at what had happened, quickly creates a new ship by breaking off a chunk of ice from a nearby ice wall and calls out for his narwhals to propel it. The pirate gang sets out after the herd, as Gutt is now determined to get revenge on Manny.

As the herd head for home, they encounter sharp-toothed sirens who seduce anyone by taking the shape of loved ones. Fortunately, Manny immediately realizes this and manages to steer the ship away from the sirens, before Sid, Diego, and Granny can get any closer to them.

Ellie, Peaches, Louis, Crash, Eddie, and the herd of other animals reach the land bridge, but find it to be destroyed. Manny, and the gang finally reach home also found it destroyed. Much to their horror, Gutt and his pirates have captured Ellie & Peaches. Manny attempts to turn himself in to Gutt in exchange for the release of his family, but Gutt prepares to kill Ellie and Peaches, as he still wants revenge on Manny, but Peaches defeats Gutt by using her half-opossum skills and saves Ellie. Gutt recovers and engages Manny in a fight when a landmass bursts out of the ocean, causing a chunk of the ship where Manny and Gutt were on to break and slide down the landmass. Manny manages to defeat him by moving to the edge of the iceberg, causing Gutt to soar upward, and finally, Manny smacks Gutt far away with a log. The iceberg slips off the landmass, causing Manny to fall off the iceberg. As he is about to land into the ocean, Manny gets rescued by Granny's "imaginary" pet Precious, with Sid and Granny "commandeering" Precious. Meanwhile, Gutt recovers, but finds a siren disguised as a female Gigantopithecus. Gutt goes up to it and gets eaten by the siren.

Manny reunites with his family and reconciles with Peaches. Shira becomes Diego's girlfriend and joins the herd and Louis is finally allowed to still be with Peaches whenever she hangs out with Ethan's gang. With the continent being destroyed by the landmass, the herd and the other animals then find another continent which they accept as their new home.

Scrat subplot

When Scrat attempts to bury his acorn at the tip of a mountain, he causes it to break in two. Scrat then falls down into the Earth's inner core and chases his acorn around it, causing the land on the earth's crust to break and separate into seven continents and he gets shot out of the earth's inner core. He lands on a small piece of ice that breaks in two, separating Scrat from his acorn.

Scrat, lost at the sea, comes across an island and finds a skeleton of a sabre-toothed squirrel. The skeleton points towards an acorn at the bottom of the ocean. Scrat finds a heavy rock and goes down to the bottom of the ocean and discovers the acorn was a map that leads to a mysterious acorn-filled island. Scrat decides to follow the map and find the island.

Later, after the herd escaped the sirens, Scrat meets a siren, which uses the shape of Scratte, an old flame of his from the third film, but Scrat turns away and ignores it. Then, the siren takes the shape of an acorn, causing Scrat to hug it and attempt to bury it (which aggravates the siren). Scrat is then attacked by the other sirens, but is able to get away alive.

Scrat completes his journey and reaching the island on the map, Scratlantis; a floating city filled with other sabre-toothed squirrels and acorns. Scrat, excited and gleeful, grabs many acorns on the island in a frenzy and eventually tries to grab a giant one used as a plug blocking a hole, which causes the city to flood and sink, leaving Scrat stranded in the middle of a dry desert in North America.

Cast

Main article: List of Ice Age characters

Ray Romano as Manny

John Leguizamo as Sid

Denis Leary as Diego

Queen Latifah as Ellie

Seann William Scott and Josh Peck as Crash and Eddie

Chris Wedge as Scrat

Keke Palmer as Peaches, Manny and Ellie's teenage daughter

Jennifer Lopez as Shira, a saber-toothed cat (Smilodon), Diego's love interest and part of Gutt's crew.

Peter Dinklage as Captain Gutt,[5] a prehistoric ape (Gigantopithecus)

Wanda Sykes as Granny, Sid's 80-year-old grandmother

Josh Gad as Louis, a molehog and Peaches' best friend, who has a crush on her

Drake as Ethan, a woolly mammoth Peaches has a crush on

Aziz Ansari as Squint, a prehistoric rabbit (Palaeolagus) and part of Gutt's crew

Nicki Minaj as Steffie, a woolly mammoth

Ester Dean as Sloth siren/Captain Gutt's siren

Rebel Wilson as Raz, an Australian prehistoric kangaroo (Procoptodon) that is part of Gutt's crew

Joy Behar as Eunice, Sid's mother[6][13]

Nick Frost as Flynn, a 4000 pound English elephant seal that is part of Gutt's crew

Heather Morris as Katie, a woolly mammoth

Ally Romano as Meghan, a woolly mammoth

Alan Tudyk as Milton, Sid's father / Fabio sloth

Kunal Nayyar as Gupta, a Bengali Badger (Chamitataxus) and part of Gutt's crew and used as the ship's imperial flag

Alain Chabat as Silas, a Blue-footed Booby from the south of France that is part of Gutt's crew

Eddie "Piolín" Sotelo as Fungus, Sid's uncle

Ben Gleib as Marshall, Sid's brother

Directed by

Steve Martino

Mike Thurmeier

Produced by

John C. Donkin

Lori Forte

Written by

Michael Berg

Jason Fuchs

Starring

Ray Romano

John Leguizamo

Denis Leary

Nicki Minaj

Drake

Keke Palmer

Jennifer Lopez

Queen Latifah

Music by

John Powell

Cinematography

Renato Falcão

Editing by

James Palumbo

David Ian Salter

Studio

Blue Sky Studios

20th Century Fox Animation

Distributed by 20th Century Fox

Release date(s)

June 27, 2012 (Europe)

July 13, 2012 (North America)

Running time

94 minutes

Country

United States

Language

English

Verhaal

Het verhaal speelt zich een paar jaar later af dan de vorige film. Peaches - de dochter van Manny en Ellie - is al een puber, en gaat om met andere jongensmammoeten. Manny wil dat echter niet. Sid wordt verrast door zijn familie, uiteraard laten zij hem weer achter, behalve zijn knorrige oma: Granny. Nadat een compleet continent op drift is geslagen, raken onze helden gescheiden van de kudde.

Ellie moet de kudde leiden. Ondertussen gebruikt het trio Manny, Diego en Sid (en Granny) een blok ijs als schip. Echter na een storm zien ze een (ijs)schip. Kapitein Gutt neemt hen gevangen. Diego ontmoet Shira, een vrouwelijke sabeltijger. Manfred, Sid, Diego en Granny komen weer vrij. Diego nodigt Shira uit om mee te gaan, uiteraard wil ze dat wel. Manny, Sid, Granny, Shira en Diego komen uiteindelijk weer terug bij Ellie, Peaches en Louis, Peaches' vriend.

Kapitein Gutt wil wraak en bindt Ellie vast. Manny vecht met Gutt op een blok ijs. Uiteindelijk gooit Manfred Gutt met zijn slurf naar een blok ijs, en drijft weg, waarna hij wordt gevangen door sirenes. Terwijl Manny nog op het ijsblok staat zwemt een walvis met Sid en Granny er in voorbij. De kudde gaat naar een eiland, waar een groep klipdassen leeft. Ze hebben Manny, Diego, Sid en Granny meegeholpen met hun plan, want hun thuis is verwoest door de scheur.

Ook dit verhaal heeft een subplot waar Scrat in speelt. Als Scrat een schatkaart vindt gaat hij op reis naar de grootste nootjesschat in de geschiedenis. Hij wordt ook gevangen op Gutts schip maar ontsnapt, als hij Scratlantis vindt, de plaats waar de schat is, ziet hij heel wat Scrats en Scrattés. Hij ziet een reuzennoot en pakt die vast, maar dan komt er een overstroming, die hij wel overleeft, maar hij komt in de woestijn terecht.