ICE AGE: CONTINENTAL DRIFT (Steve Martino, Michael Thurmeier). 94 minutes. Opens Friday (July 13). For venues and times, see Movies. Rating: NN
After 10 years, the Ice Age movies have exhausted their characters and whatever charms they had to offer, leaving the fourth instalment, Continental Drift, scrambling for material and feeling laboured in the process. The gags are prehistoric.
Manny the mammoth (Ray Romano), Diego the sabre-tooth tiger (Dennis Leary) and Sid the dimwitted sloth (John Leguizamo) are now faced with Pangaea breaking apart into continents. Separated from his family by land on the move, Manny must brave the seas with Sid and Diego in tow to get back home, while a persistent monkey pirate (Peter Dinklage) gets in their way.
While the plot hinges on natural forces, Continental Drift seems overly schematic, as if written in a boardroom. The overstuffed story hits all the predictable notes: lessons about family and individuality a romantic subplot involving Diego and another catty sabre-tooth (Jennifer Lopez) pint-sized critters that make adorable noises and pirates, because no family franchise would be complete without them.
Kids won’t mind the familiar elements, but adults will be bored and puzzling over which of the bland new creatures are voiced by Drake and Nicki Minaj, who are here as a ploy to show that Ice Age can still be hip instead of extinct.
