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Ice Age: The Meltdown(Animated)
A 20th Century Fox release of a 20th Century Fox Animation presentation of a Blue Sky Studios production.
 Produced by Lori Forte.
Executive producers, Christopher Meledandri, Chris Wedge.
Directed by Carlos Saldanha.
Screenplay, Peter Gaulke, Gerry Swallow, Jim Hecht; story, Gaulke, Swallow.
Voices:
Manny — Ray Romano
Sid — John Leguizamo
Diego — Denis Leary
Crash — Seann William Scott
Eddie — Josh Peck
Ellie — Queen Latifah
Lone Gunslinger Vulture — Will Arnett
Fast Tony — Jay Leno
(Deluxe color); editor, Harry Hitner; music, John Powell; art director, Thomas Cardone; character designer, Peter de Seve; sound designer (Dolby/DTS), Randy Thom; line producer, Bob Gordon; casting, Christian Kaplan.
Rating: PG. Running time: 90 MIN.
Column Rating: Definitely See, quite funny, great animation work.
With Your Children? Yes!
 
THE GLACIAL ONSET is over; the glaciers are receding as fast as they can melt. Manny, Sid and Diego are still together as extended family, which should be reassuring to all joint-custody tykes who reside in two homes, or are being raised by other than their biological parents. Ice Age: The Meltdown aka Ice Age 2 proves a worthy sequel, with more droll humor and new characters to freshen things up. Scrat gets more screen time, no longer relegated to the credits. If you loved Wiley E. Coyote, Scrat is his modern day vegetarian counterpart. The opening frames find Scrat at the top of a huge glacial retreating edge. Everyone is about to find out what Scrat just learned: it's serving as a dam.
  
Everyone else, far below the sheltering cliffs, cavorted in the glacial melt. A huge, lovely water park full of pools and slides basked in the sun, host to loads of 'tourists' of every imaginable species. Our charmed oasis, almost too warm for old-timers grouching about global warming, lay at the base of an old mile-high glacier. What a perfect vacation spot for our heroes and their fellow vacationers. Or—maybe not. Behind the lofty cliffs, a huge glacial bowl of melted ice sparkled under the clear, sunny skies. Probably a zillion-billion pounds, all this fresh water weight stressed the dam, which did not bode well for the valley below.
 
 
No humans around to muddy the waters, the environmental changes were being felt by a plethora of Ice Age survivors. For in Ice Age 2, there still was no evident food sources for these particular refugees who lived in harmony, free of such base urges. The only non-vegetarians seemed to be an unbelievably huge flock of vultures and two out-of-place, dolphin-swift amphibians with very big teeth. Said amphibians 'melted' out of the ancient base of the glacier, a tongue-in-cheek reference to the very dead mammoth found in a more recent meltdown. This pair survived the long freeze, for contrived tension, if not some unnecessary realism. They haunt the progress of the rag-tag caravan as they retreat from their resort below the burgeoning ice dam.
 Fast Eddy, an upright turtle (some of these guys had all the luck). He tried to warn everyone of the need to leave, pronto. No one believed his blather, as everything he said was a lead-in to some product he wanted to sell which would aid the travelers during the upcoming disastrous times. OK…According to the writers and animation teams at Blue Sky and Fox, Ice Age critters trek a lot, or at least in their franchise. Thusly, Manny's motley crew is once again headed for some far-away destination. Fast Eddy did convey a morsel of truth…a huge, hollowed-out half of a log was spotted up the valley. Everyone is headed there. Its existence was verified along the way by the leader of the ominous, lurking vulture flock, the Lone Gunslinger. The vultures, incidentally, like their feather-headed kin in the original Ice Age, undertook the musical number duties. Their entertaining interlude was an impressively choreographed parody of 'Food, Wonderful Food' (Oliver). The rest continued up the valley, headed for this potential life raft.
  
As if impending doom wasn't enough, some wiseacre's kept haranguing Manny about the likelihood he represented the last of his kind. Manny, always the cheerful type anyway, slipped into a blue funk halfway up the valley. Sid didn't help, wondering aloud whether his species had gone extinct. Sid's mouth always got him in trouble in the old days, so it was no surprise when Diego began to sound and act a lot like he did when he first met Sid.
 
 Not to worry, as Manny's troubles had just begun. Worse than being the last wooly mammoth was finding a very much alive, but disagreeable wooly mammoth—and female to boot. Insult to injury, this female, Ellie, believed herself to be a possum, with possum brothers. Ellie, the possum, was the truly bright spot in the story. She stole the limelight as the funniest character in Ice Age 2. Not only were the possums unaware of the meltdown dangers, they were unconvinced it would affect them. Their isolation served to reinforce Ellie's notion of being a possum. As her 'brothers' were disinclined to clarify matters with her, Ellie's shenanigans were comedic fresh air in the ill winds ahead of the impending flood. The animators had great fun with Manny's double takes and the knowing glances between he and Sid and Diego.
Truth won out. Always disagreeable, Manny, unable to welcome his good fortune, was short-tempered with what he took to be a goofy female mammoth. Nor could he allow himself to forget his lost family. As stubborn and proud as he, Ellie couldn't  fathom his ill-mannered arrogance and wandered off into the woods. One thing and another sparked a long buried memory. She remembered she was an orphan, fostered by the possums—but not a possum. Manny, to his credit, was supportive.
With matters settled as to which species Ellie belonged, they rejoined Manny's 'herd,' its ranks swollen now with Ellie, the mammoth, and her two rascal possum brothers. The rest of the film was devoted to the trek, its pitfalls and trials. Translated—the remaining journey was full of pratfalls, slapstick and plenty of laughter-inducing situations.
 
 
Not meant to be anything but a colorful, nonsensical animation to simply entertain, Ice Age: The Meltdown was satisfying, amusing silliness revisiting the odd, extended family that Sid had cobbled together in the original romp. As Manny now has a girlfriend, will the next entry in this franchise see ladies brought to life for Diego and Sid?
Anecdotal: On March 12 at 7:00 p.m., in Fairbanks, Alaska, the Ice Capital of the World created some press with a visit from John Leguizamo in lockstep with Ice Age 2's theatrical release. Alaska's Governor, Frank Murkowksi, 'melted' the ribbon in the kickoff ceremonies for their annual Ice Carving event. This year's slogan, "Ice, Camera, Action!" characterizes the Fairbanks Ice Park's newly-themed attractions, consisted of an ICE AGE park, which opened February 28; and a "sequel" or second section called THE MELTDOWN park, which had its grand opening the night of the March 12th event. The Ice Park also hosts the annual World Ice Art Championships from February 28 through March 11, during which time, approximately 100 master ice sculptors from around the world will create and display their magnificent works of ice art in the park. 
Photos copyright Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation.
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