Ice Age (2002)
Description: Back when the Earth was being overrun by glaciers, and animals were scurrying to save themselves from the upcoming Ice Age, a sloth named Sid, a woolly mammoth named Manny, and a saber-toothed tiger named Diego are forced to become unlikely heroes. The three reluctantly come together when they have to return a human child to its father while braving the deadly elements of the impending Ice Age.
Directors: Chris Wedge, Carlos Saldanha (co-director)
Writers: Michael J. Wilson (story by), Michael Berg (screenplay by)
Stars: Denis Leary, John Leguizamo, Ray Romano
Photos
Trivia
The drawings of characters during the end credit roll were all done by the children of the animators. The same is true of the picture that Sid draws of himself on a cave wall. Sid’s drawing was done by 3 year old Will Shefelman, son of a story artist Dan Shefelman. The story artist working on the scene was having difficulty drawing like a 3 year old so he consulted an expert.
Despite the Dodo’s less than brilliant survival instincts, they outlived all of the major character’s species. Dodos were wiped out around the mid to late 17th century, whilst woolly mammoths (Manny) died out 10,000 years ago (a dwarf race existed until 1700 BC), ground sloths (Sid) are widely accepted to have become extinct some 2500 BC (although it has been proposed a small group survived till 1550 AD), and saber tooth tigers (Diego) were wiped out around 10,000 BC. Not even Neanderthals like Roshan and his father survived the Dodo.
John Leguizamo tried 30 different voices for Sid. After viewing a documentary about sloths, he learned that they store food in their mouths; this led to him wondering what he would sound like with food in his mouth. After attempting to speak as if he had food in his mouth, he decided that it was the perfect voice for Sid.
All the actors were encouraged to improvise as much as possible to help keep the animation spontaneous.
This is the only film in the Ice Age series to show human characters, and the only Blue Sky Studios film to have any human characters for almost a decade. Blue Sky wouldn’t feature any human characters again until the 2011 film Rio.
The humans are not Homo-Sapiens, but Neanderthals. They never speak in the film.
Though Scrat was designed as a fictional animal, in 2009, scientists in Argentina unearthed the remains of a small, extinct mammal resembling a shrew with long fangs. This animal was given the scientific name of “Cronopio Dentiacutus”, in tribute to Scrat.
The first drawings seen in the cave (before entering the giant area with the mammoth drawings) are replicas of the earliest known cave drawings (found at Lascaux, in the south of France). They have been dated at somewhere between 15,000 and 17,000 years old.
When Sid, Diego, Manny and Roshan are in the ice tunnel, a Flying saucer appeared and Roshan makes a “Star Trek”-hand sign. (Vulcan Salute)