Manny, Diego, and Sid embark upon another adventure after their continent is set adrift. Using an iceberg as a ship, they encounter sea creatures and battle pirates as they explore a new world.
When Sid's attempt to adopt three dinosaur eggs gets him abducted by their real mother to an underground lost world, his friends attempt to rescue him.
Manny, Sid, and Diego discover that the ice age is coming to an end, and join everybody for a journey to higher ground. On the trip, they discover that Manny, in fact, is not the last of the woolly mammoths.
The Madagascar animals fly back to New York City, but crash-land on an African nature reserve, where they meet others of their own kind, and Alex especially discovers his royal heritage as prince of a lion pride.
The Madagascar animals join a struggling European circus to get back to New York, but find themselves being pursued by a psychotic animal control officer.
When his new father-in-law, King Harold falls ill, Shrek is looked at as the heir to the land of Far, Far Away. Not one to give up his beloved swamp, Shrek recruits his friends Donkey and Puss in Boots to install the rebellious Artie as the new king. Princess Fiona, however, rallies a band of royal girlfriends to fend off a coup d'etat by the jilted Prince Charming.
Po and his friends fight to stop a peacock villain from conquering China with a deadly new weapon, but first the Dragon Warrior must come to terms with his past.
When Gru, the world's most super-bad turned super-dad has been recruited by a team of officials to stop lethal muscle and a host of Gru's own, He has to fight back with new gadgetry, cars, and more minion madness.
The Dragon Warrior has to clash against the savage Tai Lung as China's fate hangs in the balance. However, the Dragon Warrior mantle is supposedly mistaken to be bestowed upon an obese panda who is a novice in martial arts.
When Scrat accidentally provokes a continental cataclysm with a storm, Manny is separated from Ellie and Peaches on an iceberg with Diego, Sid and Granny but he promises that he will find a way to return home. While crossing the ocean, they are captured by the cruel pirate Captain Gutt and his crew. However they escape and Manny plots a plan to steal Captain Gutt's ship and return to his homeland in a dangerous voyage through the sea. But the cruel pirates seek revenge against Manny and his family and friends.Written by
Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Phil Proctor were a deleted role of Wally the Walrus. See more »
Goofs
Precious, the whale, is depicted with both a blowhole and a pair of nostrils just forward of the eyes. This is impossible - whales' blowholes are their nostrils. See more »
Quotes
[first lines]
Manny:
[upon hearing an earthquake]
What, what was that? Ellie, did you hear that?
Ellie:
I heard it, Manny; whatever it is, it's miles away.
Manny:
Peaches, you all right? Where is she, no teenager is ever up early.
See more »
Crazy Credits
Just like the original and sequel film in the franchises, the ending credits roll alongside with drawings was made by done for children of Blue Sky Studios employees. See more »
It has been ten years since we saw our Sub-Zero Heros for the first time, and as a long-term Ice Age fan, I have experienced some ups and downs with the series. The first two movies I have really adored, especially the second one for its relaxed story and beautiful animation. But by the time they jumped the shark with the dumb addition of dinosaurs in the third film and the incoherent Christmas special (in which Christmas didn't exist), this made me loose faith in the series. Despite low expectations for this latest addition, I did opt to attend a 3D screening and I was quite surprised about how much fun I had. While Ice Age 4: Continental Drift is quiet enjoyable, its heavily flawed too.
This episode of the highly successful series see's Manny, Diego and Sid separated from the others on a sheet of ice after Scrat the saber-tooth squirrel accidentally causes Pangaea to break up with his acorn (which you've probably seen earlier in Scrat's Continental Crack-up). On the way, they find Sid's granny as a stowaway, discover a new land and come across a bunch of pirates in which Diego falls in love with one of them; a female saber-tooth called Shira. Meanwhile back at home Manny's teenage daughter Peaches finds herself in a relationship conflict with a mammoth named Ethan and a mole hog called Louis, while at the same time having to avoid the disaster caused by Scrat.
Phew! At first impression, this seems like a lot of story to get through in a 94 minute movie. However, the storytelling is all played smoothly, if predictably, but also suffers from a number of unexplained story elements like where did the pirates come from and why they became pirates in the first place. The biggest plot hole has to be the fact that the Pangaea continent Scrat splits up is entirely out of continuity with the Ice Age period since this was meant to happen millions of years prior. Did they makers even do research on this? Couldn't it have just been an simpler approach instead? I found many parts of the film to feel borrowed or rehashed from other animated films, including previous Ice Age films, and with the large amount of story, a few elements aren't focused deep enough including Diego and Shira's relationship.
Despite these issues however, here is a lot to like in this entry. As you would expect from Blue Sky, the animation is very colourful and fluid, the most impressive elements having to be the sea storms as they are well-detailed and thrilling to watch, but it has a been-there-done-that feeling since we are all familiar with the characters and setting. Plus the movie has good use of 3D which isn't too distracting or barely noticeable and I soon forgot that I was wearing the glasses. The humor in this one is pretty hit-and-miss, but when it hits, its quite funny. With the old characters retaining their personalities (which is faithful to them), there's a lot of new characters to freshen things up. While I found Sid's granny a bit annoying at times, I did particularly enjoy Peter Dinklage's evil performance as Captain Gutt as with the other pirates. However my two person favorites were Peaches and Louis because of their character development and nice (if slightly clichéd) friendship, which is something I could relate to, and I thought Josh Gad was a good choice for Louis' sweet and caring personality.
So overall, I'd have to say that Ice Age 4 was a pretty fun ride for me and was much better than I expected despite its problems. Is it great? Well I can't say its as amazing as the first two, but at least its a bit better than the third. I'm glad that I saw it, but I think the series just doesn't feel the same as it was back in 2002. It seems to be missing the nostalgia and charm that the first movie had. And with that said, I suggest its best for Fox to end this saga here instead of continuing to milk and worsen the beloved series. A fifth film is just unnecessary.
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It has been ten years since we saw our Sub-Zero Heros for the first time, and as a long-term Ice Age fan, I have experienced some ups and downs with the series. The first two movies I have really adored, especially the second one for its relaxed story and beautiful animation. But by the time they jumped the shark with the dumb addition of dinosaurs in the third film and the incoherent Christmas special (in which Christmas didn't exist), this made me loose faith in the series. Despite low expectations for this latest addition, I did opt to attend a 3D screening and I was quite surprised about how much fun I had. While Ice Age 4: Continental Drift is quiet enjoyable, its heavily flawed too.
This episode of the highly successful series see's Manny, Diego and Sid separated from the others on a sheet of ice after Scrat the saber-tooth squirrel accidentally causes Pangaea to break up with his acorn (which you've probably seen earlier in Scrat's Continental Crack-up). On the way, they find Sid's granny as a stowaway, discover a new land and come across a bunch of pirates in which Diego falls in love with one of them; a female saber-tooth called Shira. Meanwhile back at home Manny's teenage daughter Peaches finds herself in a relationship conflict with a mammoth named Ethan and a mole hog called Louis, while at the same time having to avoid the disaster caused by Scrat.
Phew! At first impression, this seems like a lot of story to get through in a 94 minute movie. However, the storytelling is all played smoothly, if predictably, but also suffers from a number of unexplained story elements like where did the pirates come from and why they became pirates in the first place. The biggest plot hole has to be the fact that the Pangaea continent Scrat splits up is entirely out of continuity with the Ice Age period since this was meant to happen millions of years prior. Did they makers even do research on this? Couldn't it have just been an simpler approach instead? I found many parts of the film to feel borrowed or rehashed from other animated films, including previous Ice Age films, and with the large amount of story, a few elements aren't focused deep enough including Diego and Shira's relationship.
Despite these issues however, here is a lot to like in this entry. As you would expect from Blue Sky, the animation is very colourful and fluid, the most impressive elements having to be the sea storms as they are well-detailed and thrilling to watch, but it has a been-there-done-that feeling since we are all familiar with the characters and setting. Plus the movie has good use of 3D which isn't too distracting or barely noticeable and I soon forgot that I was wearing the glasses. The humor in this one is pretty hit-and-miss, but when it hits, its quite funny. With the old characters retaining their personalities (which is faithful to them), there's a lot of new characters to freshen things up. While I found Sid's granny a bit annoying at times, I did particularly enjoy Peter Dinklage's evil performance as Captain Gutt as with the other pirates. However my two person favorites were Peaches and Louis because of their character development and nice (if slightly clichéd) friendship, which is something I could relate to, and I thought Josh Gad was a good choice for Louis' sweet and caring personality.
So overall, I'd have to say that Ice Age 4 was a pretty fun ride for me and was much better than I expected despite its problems. Is it great? Well I can't say its as amazing as the first two, but at least its a bit better than the third. I'm glad that I saw it, but I think the series just doesn't feel the same as it was back in 2002. It seems to be missing the nostalgia and charm that the first movie had. And with that said, I suggest its best for Fox to end this saga here instead of continuing to milk and worsen the beloved series. A fifth film is just unnecessary.