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The striking point of this third part of the ICE AGE series: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS has been the glorious 3D effects all through the movie, which, at times sweeps you into a real ice age, captivating and enthralling, but dampens your spirits at others. Contrary to the way the title suggests a new Dawn for the promised 3D effects, the movie opens with a bang and impresses in the middle, but barely holds on to your attention quite a few times. A couple of scenes are too flat to the point of being unacceptable. For example, how can one sit back and enjoy sunshine under a covering of ice, underground? Who will bring along a pregnant spouse for a risky adventure? And to talk of the story, though it has managed to latch on to your surprise, seeing the movie had been in docks since December 2008, it seems woefully stage-managed in places where the movie would surely have been better off without them.

But the movie has successfully managed to satisfy the target audience and my little brother and his friends could hardly get enough of the movie. The movie has been targeting children and 3D buffs, and needless to say, they do get their money’s worth. The 3D sequences has been simply mind boggling in few places, especially the fighting scenes and the jungle scenes when the gang go in pursuit of Sid who manages to steal dinosaur eggs from mommy, the T-Rex.

Ellie (Queen Latifah) and Manny (Ray Romano), the mammoth family is back along with their friend Diego (Denis Leary) the tiger. Ellie and Manny are expecting their child, the beast. Diego, the furious, is a touch weary of his laidback role in the gang and feels that his inner nature is dying. Sid (John Leguizamo), the central character develops a feeling of jealousy towards the mammoth couple and yearns for children of his own too. He cannot bear the enthusiasm of the mammoths and his feelings shown in the movie nicely blend with the overall storylines. A super twist has been introduced into this series, with the always amusing Scrat smitten with Scratte. Though in this movie, the chemistry between them is really hilarious. Sid, unmindful of Manny’s warnings, adopts the eggs and is carried off to the dinosaur hound by mommy. The gang, along with crash, set out to rescue Sid and meets buck, the fiery one eyed-weasel whose job is to hunt Ruby, his nemesis. How the gang and buck rescue Sid forms the rest of the story. Though it could have been better, it could arguably have been a lot worse.

The much awaited movie in the Potter series, Harry Potter and the Half blood prince is finally on and is expected to rock as its previous parts. To those who are anxious to know the bottom line of the movie, here is quick review of the story and the main characters involved. This story speaks about Harry’s sixth year at the Hogwarts school of Magic and Wizardry. The tussle between the members of the Order and the Death Eaters and Voldemort at the Ministry of Magic at the end of the fifth part makes the Ministry finally accept that Lord Voldemort has returned.

This is also the year in which Severus Snape, the erstwhile professor of Potions takes over as the Defense against the Dark Arts teacher, the subject which has eluded him for the past five years. Horace Slughorn replaces Snape as the Potions teacher. Slughorn comes to Hogwarts at the personal request from Dumbledore. Harry gets a book on Potions, the book which belonged to the Half-blooded Prince, in which are many tips and tricks scribbled on the sides. Harry uses these tricks while making Potions and impresses Professor Slughorn.

Professor Dumbledore begins to divulge all the information he has about Tom Riddle’s (Lord Voldemort) life, the Gaunts family, his parent’s marriage, his hate over his father, his grandfather’s pure-blood fanaticism, his orphanage, and also about Tom’s life at Hogwarts by using his Pensieve, a device used to store and recollect memories of various incidents. Dumbledore finds that Voldemort had split his soul into 7 and put them in 6 other horcruxes so that until they all are destroyed, he couldn’t be killed. Knowing that Tom Riddle’s diary and Gaunt’s ring were 2 of the horcruxes destroyed and Nagini, the snake was another Horcrux, Dumbledore guesses that the other 3 horcruxes could be related to the founders of Hogwarts, cup of Hufflepuff, Slytherin’s locket and some much priced possessions of Ravenclaw or Gryffindor because of Voldemort’s love for such things.

Dumbledore finds the cave where Slytherin’s locket is located and while returning after fetching it with much struggle, Dumbledore and Harry find Hogwarts under threat from the Death Eaters. Draco Malfoy had been given the task of killing Dumbledore by Voldemort. Draco disposes Dumbledore of his wand, but he cannot bring his mind to kill the professor. Snape, who had already promised Draco’s mother Narcissa with the Unbreakable Vow of protecting Draco and completing Draco’s task should he fail, kills Dumbledore and during the duel between him and Harry, reveals that he is actually the Half-blood Prince.

As the story ends Dumbledore’s funeral takes place at Hogwarts and Harry discovers the locket to be a fake. Harry now has the task of discovering all the other horcruxes and finally, killing Voldemort.