Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (Blu-ray 3D)
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (Blu-ray 3D)
Judi and Ron Barrett’s Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs is a much-loved, whimsical book about a tiny island where food falls from the sky like rain. The book serves as a jumping-off point for Sony’s animated, digital 3-D Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs which is not so much a retelling of the book as an exploration of what makes food rain from the sky on a small island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Flint (Bill Hader), a clever young inventor with a reputation for creations gone awry, has recently completed a machine that he claims will turn water into food. Like his past failed inventions, Flint’s new food-converting machine doesn’t work as planned, and on its initial test run it ends up getting launched into the sky where clouds form and begin to rain cheeseburgers. The falling burgers destroy the Swallow Falls community’s latest attempt to bolster its failing, sardine-dependent economy, but the Mayor’s (Bruce Campbell) initial fury quickly turns to greedy anticipation as he begins to realize that food falling from the sky could serve as an innovative tourist draw. As the entire town is caught up re-defining itself as “Chew and Swallow,” only Flint’s father (James Caan) remains skeptical of his son’s invention. Greed leads to some very strange weather events like spaghetti twisters and extra-giant food which, while providing a huge career opportunity for brainy weather intern Sam Sparks (Anna Faris) who’s masquerading as an air-headed television personality, also threaten to destroy the town and its inhabitants. In the end, only the collaborative efforts of Flint, his father, and Sam can save the town of Chew and Swallow from certain destruction by the out of control invention. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs is a funny, imaginative film that’s well-animated and immensely entertaining for kids and adults. Rated PG for brief mild language, but appropriate for most ages 5 and older. –Tami Horiuchi
Stills from Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (Click for larger image)
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User Ratings and Reviews
5 Stars Hilarious! Movie. A must see.
It’s been a longtime since I laughed so hard this movie is truly amazing. My Favorite character was the Monkey “Steve”, who was really Funny. Wow! Disney continues to amaze me with these cartoons movies. First, “Up” and now this I hope they keep up the good work cause I want to see more.
5 Stars Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, STEVE!
Despite successfully cross breeding a rat and a bird, as well as creating a monkey thought translator, Flintlock Wood (voiced by Bill Hader) is thought of as a failed inventory and a social pariah in Swallow Falls, a town dependent upon and known solely for sardines. When the rest of the world finds out that sardines are disgusting (what took them so long?), the town’s economy begins to tank. Seeing the town’s impending doom, the gluttonous Mayor (voiced by Bruce Campbell) decides to bolster the economy and tourism with an amusement park based upon the town’s rich sardine history.
Along with his monkey STEVE!, who conveys simple thought in one-sentence yelps, Flintlock sees this as his calling to save the town by creating a water-to-food machine that needs just a little more power. Upon the park’s grand opening, Flintlock evades the watchful eyes of his disapproving father (voiced by James Caan) and the hovering local cop (voiced by Mr. T) - both of whom have seem the dangerous results of inventions gone astray - to connect his contraption up to the local power station. The resulting explosion sends the town into chaos, Flintlock into hiding, and the machine into the clouds. Where it begins to rain down delicious burgers upon the unfortunate town and local weather girl Sam Sparks (voiced by Anna Faris) covers the phenomenon and gets her big break. Everyone wins, right? That is, until the Dangeometer on Flint’s contraption crosses into the YELLOW! and food begins to over-mutate, turning every falling treat into a Man vs. Food challenge and eventually creating a spaghetti tornado. Will the town survive the foodalanche? It’s up to Flint and Sam (and STEVE!) to peak through the clouds at the machine run amok.
It seems no children’s movie is complete without the sermon nowadays. And Cloudy is no different, providing easily relatable relationship dynamics, and lessons in overindulgence. The difference is, this movie does it almost subliminally, coating the stomach with enough comedy to wash down the medicine.
This is a very spirited, quick-witted, and funny movie, with enough originality and inventiveness for me to give it my highest possible recommendation. Great movie for the family.
Jason Elin
4 Stars I needed a 3D fix.
It’s a long way from a Pixar flick but it’s not bad! I just got it for the 3D which was pretty good when they got to it. The hole thing is in 3D anyway but 3D can really pop like when the food first started raining down. Cloudy isn’t half bad and the 3D is interesting but I am going to hold out for the live action stuff from now on.
3 Stars SAD LITTLE MOVIE
I was looking for a feel good, funny movie. Instead, I got a sad parable - never give up your dream. While there is that lesson, I can’t think what market they were aiming for. The age group that would appreciate it would be the Dora the explorer group, the little ones who love lots of fast moving colors, lots of things exploding and fast action witn no one getting hurt so they won/t be traumatized. The story is certainly geared to adults as the undertones would be lost on a child. I wouldn’t recommend it.
4 Stars Beware of falling french fries
With the prior success of Open Season and Surfs Up scoring them some points in theatres, Sony Pictures Animation followed up with a movie based on the children’s story from the 1970s by Judi & Ron Barrett. This relatively short book was concieved into being a full-length motion picture by Chris Miller and Phil Lord, who created the cult MTV animated series, Clone High.
Set on a small island off the American east coast, Flint Lockwood is a tinkerer who has spent a good portion of his life coming up with invention-after-invention, all of which have failed, including his spray-on shoes which have never come off since he put tested them on himself as a kid. His father wants him to help around his tackle shop, but Flint tries one more take at achieving his dream of being a great inventor. He makes a machine that is supposed to transform water into any kind of desired food, but he ends up accidently sending it into the atmosphere which starts turning the moisture in the air into random food. Flint manages to set up a way of controlling the machine so that he can make it rain whatever food the townspeople want. The greedy mayor convinces him to help use this as a tourist attraction for the town, but Flint mainly wants to do this to impress Sam, the cute weather reporter from New York reporting on the falling food phenomenon. He even goes to the lengths of making an entire castle made of jello to win her over. Unfortunately, the machine goes haywire, and starts dropping giant entries all over the globe. Flint and Sam, along with their mistmatched crew, head off in Flint’s jet car(which now has wings!)into the eye of the food-storm, and manage to stop the machine before the entire world is covered in takeout, even though everyone in the town has to escape on pizza-boats.
I’ll was really impressed with the animation in this. What really bought it for me was the cartoonish look of the characters and the world they lived in, while keeping it very detailed and slightly realistic. The movie goes the extra step to ellaborate from the original source material of how the small town started having it rain food. It pays homage to alot of disaster flicks, and this shows with the hilarious scenes of entire cities being ravaged by falling giant pancakes. There are some intensely funny moments in this, and I loved all the running gags with Flint’s failed former experiments. It’s a clever comedy for the whole family, and any film that has both Bruce Campbell and Mr. T in it is a solid win!
Filed under: Blue Ray Movie Reviews