"Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs" by Judi Barrett is a best-selling children's book; her plot is simple: it is about a grandfather who tells his two grandkids a fanciful bedtime story about a place called Chewandswallow, a tiny town whose weather provided the residents with food thrice a day. It rained orange juice and eggs one day. Another day's fair was a gusty wind of hotdogs! Everything was great; people didn't have to buy food. Then something went wrong. The food stopped coming out right, the broccoli was overcooked and there were violent storms of bread. So the residents sailed to a new town. End of story...and Grandpa tucks the kids in goodnight.
The movie, having to fill a lot more time, has a more involved plot-but sticks to the basic premise of the book. The movie's protagonist is a dreamer, a sort of would-be scientist. His father owns a fishing supply store and does not understand his son's dreams to pursue science and inventions. To date, the son's inventions have been a bust. Then one day, his weather/food machine actually works! All is well until the greedy and overzealous mayor, who is a limelight seeker, convinces the boy to overwork the machine. Naturally, that causes disaster. And the plot thickens. There is a love interest and plenty of double-entendres for the adults. Entertaining movie for the kids and adults.
Obviously, the movie had a more sophisticated plot than the book since the book is a fairly short and simple picture book. Hollywood had to add plot elements to keep movie-goers' attention for 90-plus minutes. However, I wasn't disappointed with the movie.
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