Ice Age: A Mammoth Christmas 720p - (2011 Lang: English)

Wonderful Modern Family Holiday Viewing!!

I'm basically older than rust - and my idea of holiday 'specials' is limited to the classics: 'Rudolph', 'Charlie Brown'... those modern cartoons that came out in the 80's were beyond lame, so I was somewhat suspicious of this when I first came across it.

Now that I've watched it twice (and will probably watch it again soon), I have to say, WELL DONE!! Modern, familiar characters - portrayed in true-to-character form - and presented in a short, family friendly format. HOORAY!! Family entertainment, happy ending - and lots of laughs for adults too!

So, added to my once yearly viewing with the aforementioned will be Scrat in his eternal hunt for the ultimate acorn.... and all the other 'Ice Age' alumni!

Ice Age: A Mammoth Christmas is a 2011 computer animated television special and part of the Ice Age franchise, produced by Blue Sky Studios and directed by Karen Disher. It premiered on November 24, 2011 on Fox in the United States and in the United Kingdom every christmas on Channel 4 and E4 and it was released two days later to DVD and Blu-ray.

Despite being produced by Blue Sky Studios, the film's animation was actually done by some animators at Blue Sky and mainly by the Los Angeles/Dallas based special effects and animation company, Reel FX Creative Studios.

Christmas has come and Scrat eyes a beaver assembling a cache of foods, among them an acorn: Scrat sneaks in and takes the acorn, along with others he finds in the area set up as decorations: he ties a large stockpile of them on a piece of bark and tries to leave with them, but they break out and leave him with nothing. Meanwhile, Manny brings the Christmas Rock out of storage, to Ellie's delight: the rock is intended as a surprise for Peaches, who comes sliding down a snow slope in a snowball fight with Crash and Eddie. Manny reveals that the Christmas Rock is the same one from his childhood, a family heirloom, and important as it lets Santa Claus find them to deliver presents.

Diego and Sid step in to see the Christmas Rock, with Sid deriding it. Manny will not let Sid near the Rock and Sid, to find his own means of decorations, decides to find a different decoration and chooses a tree. Crash and Eddie help him to decorate the tree with insects, small animals, and fish bones: to top the tree, Sid puts a star-shaped piece of ice on the top, which is accidentally flung off and hits the Christmas Rock, shattering it. Manny, furious at Sid, declares that Sid is on the "Naughty List". Manny dismisses the idea of Santa to Ellie, which Peaches overhears, and the young mammoth is shocked that Manny does not believe in Santa. Sid, in tears that he destroyed the rock, slides downhill as his tears freeze solid.

Scrat finds an acorn half frozen in a pond and steps onto the slippery surface to pull it out. After pulling it out successfully, Scrat begins to ice skate with the acorn, going through a log, where he misplaces the acorn and instead mistakenly holds onto a spider, which attacks him. Meanwhile, Sid, feet still frozen, sulks about being on the Naughty List until Peaches calls on him to snap out of it: she intends to head to the North Pole with Sid, Crash, and Eddie so as to convince Santa Claus to take Sid off the Naughty List, along with Crash and Eddie, who, despite their misdeeds, still want Christmas.

The four set off to the North Pole by following the Northern Lights, and move on until they reach a whiteout, which separates them for a moment until they find one another and move on, led by Sid, who mistakenly leads them off a cliff. As they fall, they are rescued by a flying reindeer, who takes them to the other side of the cliff and introduces himself as Prancer. Sid thanks the reindeer and moves on before he nearly falls down the cliff again and is caught by Peaches, who decides that the reindeer will go with them. Back at the village, however, Manny attempts to patch up the Christmas Rock with mud and sticks, to poor effect, when Ellie comes along, calling out that she cannot find Peaches, Sid, Crash, or Eddie. Diego states that the four of them headed out to the North Pole to find Santa; with that, Manny and Ellie move on to find Peaches and the others, led by Diego, who tracks them by, reluctantly, picking up Sid's scent. Prancer and the animals arrive somewhere near the North Pole, seeing sugar plums and peppermint bark. As they continue, they are stopped by a mini sloth and the "santourage", who keep out visitors to Santa. They move towards Prancer and the animals, causing him to fly up into a block of snow, and as they try to pull him out, the ice cracks, causing an avalanche, ruining Santa's work, and toppling the rescue trio. Santa invents the "naughty list" after Manny talks about it. All the animals fix the mess, but Santa has much more gifts than usual, so Prancer volunteers to fly the sleigh. He realizes he can't do it alone so he goes and gets his family, Dasher, Dancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, and Blitzen. Then, Santa leaves through the night sky, and everyone is back on the nice list.

I enjoyed the first two movies, was mixed on the third and liked Scrat's Continental Crack-Up. I was anticipating Ice Age: A Mammoth Christmas, and found it did live up to expectations. While short, perhaps a little too short, it is festive and fun, with the animation as great as ever especially in the beautifully detailed backgrounds and the music jaunty and putting you in the mood for the festive season. The writing even with the odd forced moment is mostly witty and funny(with Diego having the best lines), and the story is engaging and heart-warming with a warm atmosphere. I have always liked the characters and they are still entertaining, with Scrat stealing every scene he's in and Peaches is adorable, and the voice acting is solid across the board.

This is a half-hour Christmas special featuring the Ice Age gang, which came out between films 3 and 4. Well.. it's really more of a 20-minute movie actually if you don't count the credits. Manny makes a statement about some of the gang being on Santa's naughty list as they did not behave too well recently, so Sid, Crash, Eddie and Peaches are worried and go on a journey to find Santa, check the list and maybe convince him that they don't belong on the list, so Christmas will happen for them too. On the road to Santa, of course lots of mishaps and entertaining fails occur, some of them involving a clumsy reindeer they meet. It's all Christmasey this time, almost a bit too much. They make their own Christmas tree, keep singing carols and finally not only meet Santa, but destroy Christmas and rescue it and all this in only 20 minutes. It certainly does not come as a surprise as the snowiest and iciest of animation franchises currently also has a Christmas special now. It's all decent entertainment and I liked the fact how Manny basically is taught during this short film that there actually is a Santa and that there also is a naughty list. Of course, in the end everybody is happy and nobody is on the naughty list anymore. By the way, Scrat also gets some screen time right at the beginning mostly, but not so much this time. Still, you can check out his short films for that. Obviously, it's fairly difficult to create any Christmas relevance with a character that does not speak and is only always on the hunt. The rest is very much worth watching though and recommended to the fans of the Ice Age franchise.