Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 Movie Review

So, I just finished watching Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 (2013) with some friends. I've still got food puns on the brain and I'm afraid a few might slip into my review. I was really looking forward to Cloudy 2 since I loved its predecessor so much. As is the case with most sequels, this one wasn't as good as the first one, but there were so many witty jokes that I still enjoyed it for the most part. Now, lettuce get on with the summary.

Picking up moments after the first movie left off, Flint Lockwood (Bill Hader) and his friends have just saved the world from the food storm. Super-inventor Chester V (Will Forte), the CEO of Live Corp, is tasked to clean the island. The residents of Chewandswallow are relocated to the mainland and Chester offers Flint a job at Live Corp where the best inventors in the world create technologies for the betterment of mankind. Returning to Chewandswallow keeps getting pushed back, until one day Chester shows Flint a video shot on the island. Flint's food making machine is still operating and is creating mutant food beasts like hungry tacodiles and shrimpanzees. Flint gathers his friends Sam Sparks (Anna Faris), "Chicken" Brent (Andy Samberg), Officer Earl Devereaux (Terry Crews), Flint's dad (James Caan), and pet monkey Steve (Neil Patrick Harris) and return to the island of Chewandswallow to deactivate the food making machine before the foodimals learn to swim and terrorize the mainland.

With one exception, all of the original cast returns to reprise their roles. Mr. T, who played Officer Deveraux in the first film, declined the offer to return for the sequel. Terry Crews stepped in and did a fantastic job; I wouldn't have realized the actor was changed had I not checked the cast listing. I pity the fool who tries replace Mr. T, but Crews did a respectable job.

So, Cloudy 2 wasn't as good as the first movie. The change in directors from the first to second movie is evident; it seems that this one wasn't given as much care and intelligent skill that the first film had. Part of what made the first movie so good was the even pacing, the well developed characters, hysterical and witty jokes, and fantastic animation. The main problem with Cloudy 2 was that it was very rushed. There was very little down time between action scenes, and it left almost no time to develop the characters. It results in a standardized half-baked recipe for kids movies; loud, weird, chaotic, with an occasional poop joke thrown in.

Having said that, the movie is still conceptually creative. It reminds me of a foodie-version of The Lost World: Jurassic Park as if conjured up by Hollywood's Golden Age animator Tex Avery. Cloudy 2 is chock full of really witty jokes and puns. Our heroes come across food animals and start giving them names like peanut butter and jellyfish, flamangos, mosquitoast, and watermelephants. A lot of foodimals were not actually named, but I feel like there were puns behind them, such as a buffaloaf, hippotato, and apple piethons. Everyone panics when there's a leek in the boat. Anyone who can make this many running gags about leeks deserves props in my opinion. The jokes are numerous and pretty good, even if the rest of the script is relatively lackluster

The animation is great. The characters are as spastic and expressive as they were in the first movie, and it still has that Saturday morning cartoon vibe. It's brilliantly colorful and gorgeous to look at. Chester is particularly entertaining to watch. I feel like he was a play on Steve Jobs; he had this weird zen-like fluidity with expressions and gestures that defy a bone structure. He maintains balance and usually finishes his rubbery movements in a position of symmetry. The foodimals are highly creative, and have some pretty realistic animal-like movements. It's just delightful to watch.

This second helping of Meatballs seems to confuse bigger for better. It has lots of action but lacks the character development and story quality of the first course, making a hash of things. The manic pace and its unwillingness to settle on a single theme makes it feel like a quick-hit sugar high. Cloudy 2 isn't as good as the first movie, but still, it's kind of fun. The jokes and puns will please most everyone, and the animation will dazzle viewers. Kids will likely get a bigger kick out of this one than the adults will. It's worth seeing if you enjoy wacky movies like this, but unless you have kids who will want to see it again and again, it's a renter.

Okay, just because I loved the foodimals so much I'll ask you to come up with one of your own. Mine would be a guaca-mole. Hah! Comment below and tell me one of your own!

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs Movie Review

I remember having the picture book Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs read to me in first grade. In 2009, a CGI animated movie based on the children's picture book was made. It's one of the few examples I can think of where the movie is better than the book it's based on.

Flint Lockwood (Bill Hader) thinks he's a genius, but none of his inventions are useful or even make sense. He has the support of his mother, but after she passes away, he's left alone with his father (James Caan) who thinks Flint should give up inventing. After the world discovers that sardines are "super gross" the demand for the small island town of Swallow Falls' primary export, canned sardines, plummets, leaving the town to subsist on nothing but the tiny fish. Flint decides to try his latest invention, a machine that can turn water into food. But something goes wrong and the machine ends up in the atmosphere. Later it starts raining food. The Shifty Mayor (Bruce Campbell) tries to use this as a way to help their community, but when Flint senses something wrong with the machine, the mayor convinces him to ignore it. However, as Flint predicted, chaos ensues. Flint enlists the help from his pet monkey (Neil Patrick Harris), weather intern Sam Sparks (Anna Faris), former sardine cannery mascot Brent (Andy Samberg), and an overzealous police officer (Mr. T) to help stop the food-weather storm destroying their town and keep it from spreading to the rest of the world.

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs differs greatly from its source material. The picture book is all about grandpa's silly stories about a place where food falls from the sky. The movie has nothing to do with that other than the fact the food falls from the sky. The movie is actually well written and has a fairly complex plot for a family feature.

The characters are great. Flint is unappreciated for his efforts and is comically awkward. Sam is intelligent and talented in meteorological science, but feels she needs to hide that "nerdy" aspect of herself so she can fit the pretty, ditzy weather forecaster stereotype. Flint's Dad is a technophobic fisherman, a single father and widower who has no idea how to relate to his son. Officer Devereaux is basically a parody of Mr. T, who also provides the voice for the character. He's hyper-manly, ridiculously athletic, passionate about his job, and loves his young son dearly. Even the character's partially bald head is a reverse of Mr. T's signature Mohawk. He often delivers hilariously wacky lines like, " My chest hairs are tingling! Something's wrong." All the characters are well written, relatable, and loveable.

The animation in Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs is fantastic. The characters' movements are hilariously spastic and expressive, similar to an old Saturday morning cartoon. There is no subtlety anywhere in the movie when it comes to movement. The stretchy facial expressions that Flint in particular makes are hysterical and really conveys the characters' thoughts and feelings. They're easily on par with the laughable expressions used in Bill Watterson's Calvin and Hobbes comic strips.

Remarkable detail was put into the animation. Props like a water pitcher made of glass, have little imperfections that distort the background a little bit as you look through the pitcher, and it has dated 70's style floral design painted on it. The explosions were beautifully animated and astoundingly colorful. The movie's color palette made everything look beautiful to look at.

The dialogue is absolutely hysterical. After Flint discovers he cannot remove his spray on shoes invention, he narrates a somber, melodramatic tone, "I wanted to run away that day, but you can't run away from your own feet." Flint's dad tries to console his young son by saying, "Not every sardine was meant to swim" to which Flint responds, "I don't understand fishing metaphors!" One of my favorite line was when Flint renewed his commitment to be great and fix the problems he created. He then says, "Come on, Steve! We've got some diem to carpe!" The movie is quotable, but the delivery from the talented voice actors makes it all the funnier.

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs is an incredibly funny and creative movie that features gorgeous animation, fun characters, a well written script, hilarious comedy, and is genuinely fun to watch. The movie pays homage to other disaster movies like Twister, Armageddon, The Core, and The Day After Tomorrow, except with over-sized food rather than meteorological phenomena. It's a fun, slapstick family adventure comedy and viewers of any age will likely get a kick out of it. It's a little formulaic, but I can't think of another movie that features the hero dangling above a chasm of razor-sharp peanut brittle while grasping onto a red licorice rope held by his girlfriend who has a peanut allergy. It's a great movie and is worth owning a copy.

What's your favorite disaster movie? Comment below and tell me why!

Lost in Translation Movie Review

Bill Murray has been appearing mostly in independent films and as cameos in bigger budget films. For Lost in Translation (2003) director Sofia Coppola wrote the lead role specifically for Bill Murray, and later said that if Murray turned it down, she wouldn't have done the movie.  In fact, she wasn’t even sure if Bill Murray was going to do the film, only having a verbal confirmation. It was on the first day of filming that Murray actually showed up.

Bob Harris (Bill Murray) is an American film actor who is far past his prime. He visits Tokyo, Japan to appear in some celebrity endorsed commercials. While at his hotel he meets Charlotte (Scarlett Johansson), the young wife of a visiting photographer. Charlotte is trying to find her place in life, and Bob is tolerating a mediocre marriage back in the States. Charlotte is puzzled with how much her husband, John (Giovanni Ribisi), has changed in their two years of marriage, while she's been unable to launch a creative career of her own. The spark has gone out of Bob's marriage, and he's become disillusioned with his career. Bob and Charlotte end up being perfect, yet improbable traveling companions. Both suffer confusion and some amusing antics due to the cultural and language barriers  between themselves and the Japanese. As their companionship deepens, they come to the realization that their visits to Japan (and each other) will soon end. But does it need to?

Murray’s and Johansson’s characters were both well developed and interesting. Bob was inundated with mundane domestics; even while he was in Japan, his wife sent him carpet samples though FedEx so he could decide what color to re-carpet the home office. She also faxed him samples of shelves to decide how to redecorate their home. Phone calls with his wife usually involved her being frantic about home decorations and screaming children, and not listening to anything Bob has to say.

Charlotte is stuck at a hotel while her negligent husband is doing photo shoots for celebrities. He doesn’t seem interested in his wife of only 2 years. When Charlotte and John run into a celebrity  acquaintance (played by Anna Faris), John jumps at the opportunity to do a one-on-one “photo shoot” with her and tells Charlotte that “he'll be working, and she won't have a good time if she comes along with him.” So Charlotte is constantly left on her own to mope around the hotel and wonder what her place in life is.

These are relatable issues, yet other issues bring to mind the “First World Problems” internet jokes where pictures of people crying are coupled with captions like, “had to park far from the door.” Bob is a celebrity! Who hasn’t dreamed of being interviewed on talk shows, having people snap photos of you, and asking for your autograph? Charlotte is visiting Japan! What percentage of Americans get to travel overseas, let alone to Japan? If I were there I’d be on the streets every day touring and exploring everything I could, regardless of how busy my self-absorbed spouse was. That was a theme in the movie; the attitude you have towards events in your life really affect your feelings about life. These characters were literally doing what many people dream of and were still despondent.

Over the course of the film, several things get “lost in translation.” In a particularly funny scene while Bob is working on a commercial, the Japanese director uses lots of hand gestures and long bits of instructions in Japanese. An interpreter translates this to Bob as, “He wants you to turn, look in camera. OK?” Bob looks bewildered and asks, “…is that all he said?” The characters themselves are lost, too; lost in the alien Japanese culture, lost in their own lives, and lost in their relationships.

The relationship that Bob and Charlotte form is interesting. It’s almost expected that if (in movies) two characters of the opposite sex form a relationship it will always be a sexual one, maybe even a romantic one. But the relationship that Bob and Charlotte form is a platonic relationship. They share something deeply personal with each other; their true feelings, rather than something as commonplace as their genitals. Their relationship was fascinating to see, and I would love to see more relationships like this in movies. In fact, the only sexually explicit content in the movie is some topless strippers in the background when the two are exploring Tokyo.

The scenery captured in Lost in Translation is so gorgeous! There are strange locations that captivated the feel of Japan, and the movie really explored Japanese culture. In the context of the characters being tremendously out of place, everything looked amazing and defies description. From simple family-run restaurants to flashy casinos and arcades to tranquil Zen monasteries, everything was eye-catching and beautiful to see. I’m ready to go visit.

Lost in Translation was a good movie, though I don’t think it would appeal to everyone. It’s pretty slow moving and dramatic. The visuals are stunning, and I think it’s worth watching for that aspect. Most of the “adult” elements (apart from the previously mentioned strippers) are only talked about, not visually depicted. It’s a fairly clean movie. It ended with the characters simply feeling better, but their problems remained unresolved. That felt a bit anticlimactic, but still complimented the theme of attitude affecting your view of life. This was a well done movie, but I wouldn’t rush out to see it unless you enjoy drama films.

Can you think of a movie that really captivates the essence of a certain culture? What's the movie and what's the culture? Comment below and tell me about it!