Review of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) by Matthew F — 27 Jun 2014

A light, simple, but ultimately very fun animated movie from a fledgling Sony Pictures Animation outfit, "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs" doesn't have very much to say. But in saying it anyway, it has resulted in a visually resplendent film, bolstered by some very funny writing on debut from writer/director team Christopher Miller and Phil Lord.

The story follows a young, slightly mad inventor Flint Lockwood, who tries to bring life back into his struggling town by inventing a machine that can turn water into food. However, things go wrong, and soon the entire weather system of his town is dominated by pasta, cheeseburgers and medium-rare steak.

It tells the usual tales in an animated film - about being true to who you actually are, and about believing in yourself when no-one else will. But the humour elevated the movie about the average fare - with voice talent like Bill Hader, Anna Faris, James Caan, Neil Patrick Harris, Bruce Campbell, Andy Samberg, Benjamin Bratt and Mr T certainly helping that aspect out.

And the different uses of food in different weather scenarios sure was inventive, and produced some nice looking scenes.

Overall, this was simply a very entertaining piece of fluff.