It was the calm before the storm, with only one new wide release daring to debut the weekend before The Dark Knight Rises crushes everything in sight. That new release is 20th Century Fox’s Ice Age: Continental Drift (essay). So it is with little surprise that the fourth entry in Fox’s animation crown jewel, sadly the first terrible entry of the previously ‘not bad’ series thus far, was number one this weekend, nor is it little surprise that it debuted with an estimated $46 million. That’s a little low all things considered, but Fox couldn’t give two craps about domestic gross anyway.
None of the prior three Ice Age films have ever topped $200 million domestic, but that didn’t stop Ice Age 3: Dawn of the Dinosaurs from exploding overseas three summers ago and earning $690 million overseas for a $886 million worldwide total, good for the third-highest grossing overseas total ever at the time (it’s eighth today) and still the most lopsided foreign grosses (77%) for any movie grossing over $775 million total (removing European films like The Full Monty, European-targeted titles like The Adventures of Tintin, or Miyazaki releases, it’s still #7 overall). So yeah, this new film opened with “just $45 million”. Gasp(!), that’s below the $68 million debut of Ice Age: The Meltdown in 2006 ($82 million adjusted for inflation) and the $66 million Wed-Sun debut of Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs ($41 million Fri-Sun), and right in line with the $46 million debut of Ice Age ($62 million adjusted for inflation). Despite the 3D bump (which the third film enjoyed as well), this fourth Ice Age film may struggle to top $150 million, putting it well below Ice Age ($176 million), Ice Age 2 ($195 million), and Ice Age 3 ($196 million). Oh well, it was already at $225 million overseas before it even opened in America, and it’ll surely be well over $300 million today with at least a $500-600 million worldwide total for the (comparatively cheap) $100 million animated feature. This is one franchise were America just doesn’t matter.
