This is lovely animation that is every child’s fantasy.
It follows an inventor Flint Lockwood played by Bill Hader (Knocked Up), who has been inventing items no one really wanted, and couldn’t find a useful purpose for, such as shoes without shoelaces; that unfortunately he is unable to remove, as well as flying rats, a thought translator for a monkey called Steve; played by Neil Patrick Harris (Harold and Kumar escape from Guantanamo Bay),which has become his pet and his right-hand man for his projects, as well as a television that walks.
What adds to the hilarity is that all through the movie parts of his inventions make little cameos, the flying rats are never too far away, as well as the walking television.
Flint lives in a small town called Swallow “underneath the A of the Atlantic” that is known for its sardines, its sardines are found everywhere for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and the town mayor Shelbourne played by Bruce Campbell (Spider-Man 3) is trying to boost tourism by having a Swallow Sardines theme park complete with the original promoter of Swallow Sardines “Baby Brent” played by Andy Samberg, who has now grown but is still riding on his reputation.
Flint tries to invent a machine that makes food by simply adding water, but his dad Jim played by James Caan (Las Vegas) is tired of his many inventions that have so far served no meaningful purpose, and would like him to give it up to start working with him at the local family shop that sells Swallow Sardines.
Flint agrees to work with his father, but does not concede defeat. At the opening ceremony of Swallow Sardines theme park, he puts the finishing touches to his invention but manages to destroy the theme park in the process, much to the anger of the local policeman Earl Devereaux played by Mr T. (for some strange reason he seems to move around in acrobatics), but as luck would have it, his invention is blown away into the clouds, soon afterwards it starts to rain hamburgers. Everyone is fascinated as to how this came about, especially a news reporter Sam Sparks played by Anna Faris (F.A.Q about time travel) who has just started her new job, and meets Flint. Flint realising his invention works, tells Sam that it was his plan all along (to impress her).
Soon the magic of the movie takes shape with Flint being able to order anything from his base where his device in the clouds causes it to rain said product, be it eggs and ham, bread, toast, any food that can be thought of, is rained down.
The mayor realising the potential of a town that rains food (and getting overly accustomed to it) invites everyone in the world to Swallow, where they can have any food they want, simply rained down from above, he realises this will boost the town’s tourism and put Swallow on the map.
Flint’s dad on the other hand sees something very wrong with a device that just brings food from the sky, and tells him it doesn’t feel natural, unlike his sardine business which has to be manually compressed into a tin, but Flint is caught up in the acceptance of his invention and the super hero status he has now cultivated after years of ridicule, so dismisses any worries with the device.
It has come classic scenes, especially where Flint is trying to get his dad to operate his computer. It is a unique and lovely movie the whole family will enjoy, especially the image of all kinds of food raining down from the sky.