Ice Age: Continental Drift

Ice Age: Continental Drift

(2012)
Animation | Adventure | Comedy

94 min.

Rated: PG

Rating: C+

Directors:
Steve Martino, Mike Thurmeier

Writers: 
Michael Berg (screenplay), 
Jason Fuchs (screenplay)

Stars:
Ray Romano, Denis Leary and John Leguizamo

A cataclysm of continental proportions is set into play by Scrat's nutty pursuit of the cursed acorn that he’s been after since the dawn of time. He triggers the greatest adventure of all for Manny, Diego and Sid.  Manny leads the herd and Sid is reunited with his cantankerous Granny, as they encounter a ragtag menagerie of seafaring pirates using an iceberg as a ship who are determined to stop them from returning home.

I saw Ice Age 4 in the no-3D format. I am not a big fan of all these recent animated films, 'The Pirates! Band of Misfits' for example was appallingly tedious and humorless.It's not that I can't enjoy an animated film it's more that they seem that those of late are being churned out on a conveyor belt, extremely formulaic. Ice Age: Continental Drift (also known as Ice Age 4: Continental Drift or simply as Ice Age 4) is no exception. This is the only one of the Ice Age series I had previously seen Ice Age 2 (I think it was during a flight to Europe). 

The entire premise is about as credible, fresh and believable as Al Gore's global warming hoax. If you are a big fan of the previous films you will probably like this one too, kids will likely enjoy it. It is full of sixth-grade humor, puns and wisecracks. The pacing was good, the story seemed to move along pretty fast but it still felt like more than 94 minutes. Sid (John Leguizamo) is the saving grace for the film. His enthusiasm makes even old, previously used jokes work, but that is the biggest problem for the film, the old jokes. Everything seems like it's a rehash of the earlier film(s), nothing felt fresh or new. A little Wanda Sykes who voices Granny, goes a very long way. I found Jennifer Lopez particularly irritating but maybe that's just me. I did enjoy the Maggie Simpson cartoon 'The Longest Daycare' that played before the movie.

The Plot

As in the previous films, the main protagonists are the mammoth Manny, the sloth Sid, sabre-toothed cat Diego, and, in a parallel storyline, the saber-toothed squirrel Scrat. Scrat's hunt for acorns triggers the break-up of the Pangaea continent into the continents as we know them today. In the meantime, Manny and his wife Ellie deal with their 19-year-old daughter Peaches who has a crush on Ethan. Peaches' best friend, a molehog named Louis, also appears to have a crush on her. When Manny catches Peaches hanging with Ethan after he told her not to, Manny and Peaches have a falling out. Soon after, the breakup of the continent separates Manny from his family. Manny gets stuck on a floating ice raft together with Sid, Diego, and Sid's annoying grandmother Granny. A large moving landmass drives Ellie, Peaches, Crash and Eddie, Louis, Ethan, and a herd of other animals towards a land bridge, where they hope to reunite with Manny.

 

Scrat's Continental Crack-up

Meanwhile, Scrat, lost at sea also, finds an acorn-shaped map, which leads to a mysterious acorn-filled island. Scrat decides to follow the map and find the island, but as he begins his journey, he is suddenly captured by a gang of animal pirates on an large ship-shaped iceberg, who are sailing the oceans.

 Ice Age: Continental Drift - Official Trailer #2

Manny and his friends are captured also by the pirate gang, led by a giant ape named Gutt. Gutt and the pirate gang attempt to persuade Manny to leave family life and join the pirates, but he refuses. Gutt takes this as an insult, and attempts to make the herd walk the plank, but they (along with Scrat, who continues his journey) manage to escape, in the process destroying the pirate ship, and again float on the oceans on a small ice raft. They rescue the female pirate saber-toothed cat Shira, who had been left behind by the pirates. She reluctantly joins the group, though states that the pirates will come back for her. She and Diego slowly begin to fall in love with each other during the adventure.

The group reaches an island and encounters a group of hyraxes, as well as the pirates, who are building a new ice ship elsewhere on the same island. The herd plan to steal the ship and use it to get back home. The next morning, as the herd is preparing their plan, Shira escapes and rejoins the pirates, but gets reprimanded by Gutt instead of being welcomed back, after Gutt realized that she had been with the herd, but had not attacked them.
The herd, along with the hyraxes, overtake the new ice ship and, with some help from Shira, who changed her mind after being reprimanded by Gutt, sail away. Gutt, in anger, quickly turns a new iceberg into a ship, propelled by narwhals, and chases Manny's gang, determined to get revenge.
Meanwhile, Peaches has been still hanging with Ethan and a group of teenage mammoths, but after realizing that they don't care about the danger and thinking that being a best friend with a molehog is ridiculous, she leaves them and returns to Louis. When Ellie, Peaches, Louis, Crash and Eddie reach the land bridge, they find it to be destroyed. Meanwhile, Manny, Sid, Granny and Diego encounter sirens, depicted as sharp-toothed creatures who take the shape of loved ones and attempt to lure the sailors. Fortunately, Manny realizes this and manages to steer the ship away from the sirens. Later, Scrat meets a siren, which uses the shape of his former girlfriend from the third film, Scratte, to attempt to lure him. When this fails, the siren takes the shape of an acorn, causing Scrat to run up and hug it. The siren changes back and attacks Scrat, but he gets away.
 
The next morning, Manny, Sid, Diego and Granny finally reach home, but, much to their horror, find out that Gutt and his pirate gang had beaten them to it and captured Ellie and Peaches. Manny attempts to turn himself in to Gutt in exchange for releasing his family, but Gutt doesn't keep his side of the bargain and prepares to kill the family. However, Louis, Ethan and the teenage mammoths come to rescue, starting a battle, during which Shira rescues Diego, and Granny's presumed imaginary pet Precious, a large sperm whale (a Livyatan melvillei), appears, defeating the pirates. Peaches rescues Manny, but as they are about to escape, Gutt attacks him again.

Gutt and Manny engage in a final fight, but Manny manages to defeat him. Manny arrives in time to pick up Ellie and Peaches, who are caught between the moving landmass and the ocean at the location where the land bridge once existed. Meanwhile, Gutt is killed when he ends up being devoured by a siren, taking on the shape of a female of his species. After sailing over the ocean, the herd and all the animals find the hyrax island which they accept as their new home. Manny and Peaches reconcile, Manny finally admits that Sid is not the screw-up after all, but a hero, Diego and Shira become boyfriend and girlfriend, while Louis is finally allowed to still be with Peaches whenever she hangs out with Ethan's gang.

The film ends with Scrat finally reaching the island on the map, Scratlantis (a Scrat version of Atlantis), a floating city filled with other sabre-toothed squirrels and nuts. However, Scrat, due to his nut obsession, grabs many nuts in a frenzy and eventually attempts to grab a giant one blocking a hole. He grabs it, despite the sabre-toothed squirrel leader's warnings, causing the city to sink to the bottom of the ocean, leaving Scrat in the middle of a newly-created land: the desert. Scrat's eyes burn, and he screams in pain and frustration.

Cast

Ray Romano
Manny

John Leguizamo
Sid

Denis Leary
Diego

Queen Latifah
Ellie

Seann William Scott
Crash

Josh Peck
Eddie

Jennifer Lopez
Shira

Jeremy Renner
Gutt

Wanda Sykes
Granny

Keke Palmer
Peaches

Aziz Ansari
Squint

The Amazing Spider-Man

The Amazing Spider-Man

2012

Action/Adventure

2 hr.16 min.
PG-13 Sequences of Action and ViolenceRating: B+

Director: Marc Webb
Writers: James Vanderbilt (screenplay)
Alvin Sargent (screenplay)
Steve Kloves (screenplay)
Stars: Andrew Garfield 
Emma Stone
Rhys Ifans

Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) finds a clue that might help him understand why his parents left him with his aunt and uncle when he was just 4 years old (Max Charles as young Peter Parker) and then mysteriously disappeared. His path of discovery,13 years later, puts Peter on a collision course with Dr. Curt Connors, his father's former partner, to complicate things, the now 17 year old Peter is trying to find himself and deal with falling in love for the first time.

I saw the IMAX 3D version. I had expected more from the 3D special effects based on the trailers. It was OK but not as effective as I think it could have been. Within its genre, I think Spider-Man is both a successful and enjoyable film. I liked it, I think, a little more than the earlier version Spider Man (2002) with Tobey Maguire.  The film is strongest in the first half before it turns into the full-fledged action film. The CGI action sequences with The Lizard takes a little luster off of the otherwise excellent setup in the first half. I was unsure if Andrew Garfield would be up to par with Tobey Maguire's portrayal of Peter Parker/Spider Man. Not only was he up to the task but in my opinion his Peter Parker is more intriguing. Now granted, I'm not a Marvel Comic Book geek or fan, nor am I versed in Superhero-ology, so I don't know how faithful this remake is to the actual comics created by the Stan Lee team so long ago at Marvel.

Click on any of the photos to enlarge

and see the detail in the 'Spidy' suit.

For me, the film's major flaw is that it seems to be two films glued together. The first half of the film where we learn about Peter Parker and the actors get a chance to develop their character and, well, actually 'act', and the second half which is an action film. The first half is much better than the second and when the second half comes along it seems a little too fantasy oriented where the first half is more focused on possibility and plausibility. It sort of looses credibility when it takes the Godzilla in New York route. The second half is gratuitous action, action for the sake of action and a backdrop for 3D effects (which, as I said earlier, were a let down form what the trailers promised). One particularly egregious melodramatic moment, in the second half, involves some construction worker crane operators meant to tug ant your heartstrings.

Uncle Ben (Martin Sheen), Aunt May (Sally Field) and Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield)

Synopsis:  

(*Spoiler Alert* If you don't want to know how the movie ends don't read the last couple of paragraphs)

A young Peter Parker is playing hide-and-seek with his scientist father Richard when he discovers that his father's (Richard Parker) study has been broken into. Richard gathers up some hidden documents and Peter's parents take him to the home of his Aunt May and Uncle Ben then mysteriously depart. Years later, a teenage Peter attends Midtown Science High School, where he's bullied by Flash Thompson and catches the eye of Gwen Stacy. At home, Peter finds Richard's hidden papers, and learns his father worked with fellow scientist Dr. Curt Connors at Oscorp. Faking his way into Oscorp as part of a new batch of interns, Peter sneaks into a lab where extremely strong "biocable" is being created from genetically-modified spiders, one of which bites him. On the subway ride 
home, awakening to bystanders on the subway, whom he scuffles with He discovers increased agility, strength, and spider like abilities. At home he discovers the spider that bit him which he stores away.
Parker introduces himself to the one-armed Dr. Connors at his home and gives Connors his father's "decay rate algorithm", the missing piece in Connors' experiments on regenerating limbs. Connors is being pressured by his superior, Dr. Ratha, to devise a cure for the dying Oscorp chief Norman Osborn.

Peter Parker discovering his new talent for Subway Surfing

Uncle Ben (Martin Sheen) and Aunt May (Sally Field) are puzzled by Peter's sudden behavior changes

Dr. Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans) in his Oscorp lab

Peter Parker's first Spider-Man mask

Peter schools the H.S. bully Flash

In school, after humiliating Flash (Chris Zylka) the local High School bully by besting him on the  basketball court and inadvertedly destroying the hoop, Peter gets in trouble and is sent to the office, forcing Uncle Ben to switch a work shift in order to meet with the principal. He tells Peter that he will have to  pick up Aunt May for him when she gets off work tonight. But Peter, after learning more about his new powers, meets with Dr. Connors at his office at Oscorp, and forgets about his aunt. When Ben calls him Peter ignores the call, he is busy watching the limb-regeneration formula work on a laboratory mouse. When Peter returns home, Ben scolds him for having forgotten to pick up May, reminding him that his father believed that people should always make their responsibility their priority. A distraught Peter storms off, and when Ben goes looking for him. Peter attempts to buy a milk and falls two cents cents short and is refused service by the store clerk, The clerk is then robbed by a man peter refuses to apprehend. Ben sees the thief running and attempts to stop him. As Ben and the thief wrestle over a gun, Ben is killed before Peter's eyes and the murderer escapes.

Dr. Curt Connors / The Lizard (Rhys Ifans)

Hero work can hurt

Shortly afterward, using a police sketch of the killer. Peter uses his new abilities to hunt criminals matching the killer's description. After attacking a man who fit the description, he is chased by a gang and falls inside an abandoned gym, seeing a Mexican luchador wrestling poster inspires him to create a mask. Later, he adds a Spandex suit for mobility and suddenly becomes Spider-Man, the new folk hero hunted by NYPD Capt. George Stacy, Gwen's father. Peter accepts Gwen's invitation to have dinner with her family and later admits to her that he is the masked vigilante her father is determined to destroy. She agrees to keep his identity safe from her father.

Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone) tends to her hero's wounds

Ratha fires Connors for refusing to immediately start human trials of the new drug. He takes a sample of the drug and plans to test it on Veterans at the VA  hospital under the guise of flu shots. Desperate, Conners tries the formula on himself, he passes out from pain and when he awakens finds his missing arm has regenerated.

However, he mutates into a powerful man-lizard hybrid and chases Ratha at Williamsburgh Bridge, sending cars over the side. Peter, now calling himself Spider-Man, saves each fallen car with the biocable "web" he fires from mechanical devices on his wrists.

Spider-Man confronts the Lizard in the sewers, barely escaping alive. Having learned Spider-Man's real identity, the Lizard attacks Peter at school and plans to unleash the drug all over Manhattan to mutate all humans into lizards using a cloud-generating device at Oscorp Tower, unaware that Gwen is there making an antidote for the condition at Peter's request. 

Captain Stacy (Denis Leary)

The police mobilizes to stop both him and Spider-Man, but are delayed when the Lizard infects officers with small dosages of the chemical. In the manhunt, Captain Stacy learns Spider-Man's real identity and allows him to go stop Connors while proceeding to the tower himself. Both of them fight together to delay the Lizard while Spider-Man modifies the machine to disperse the antidote instead, restoring the humanity of Connors and the infected officers, and allowing him redeem his humanity and save Peter from a fatal fall from the tower.

Spider-Man / Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) swinging over New York City

Peter hurries back to Captain Stacy, but unfortunately it is too late, The Lizard has mortally wounded the Captain, but before he dies, Stacy makes Peter promise to keep Gwen safe by staying away from her. Peter keeps that promise,  initially, which offends Gwen until she realizes his reasons. While in class, Peter is told by a teacher to "not make promises he can't keep" to which Peter replies "but those are the best kind" while looking at Gwen. She smiles, and it is implied that the two resume their relationship. With his first challenge surmounted, Peter officially takes to the streets as a proper hero.

In a scene during the end credits, the now-imprisoned Connors speaks with a mysterious man who appears in his cell, who inquires about Connors divulging information about Peter's father. Connors tells the visitor to leave Parker alone, and the scene abruptly ends with flashes of lightning.