Food makes us happy. The plentiful scenes of fare on display in abundance in Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) will make us smile, but may also make us think. When is too much more than enough?

We have probably never seen anything like this on the screen—raining cuisine in abundance.

This would be spectacular to see as a blockbuster movie which makes raining meals seem real—done with seamless visual effects. However, the animated sequences of feed coming down from the sky—in the second half—is plenty eye popping.

This family film puts fare right in your face, up close and personal. It may even make you sick and not crave another cheeseburger again for at least another two months. Too many cheeseburgers is certainly more than enough. It’s too much.

A special food machine

In this movie, Swallow Falls is an American town slash island in the middle of the ocean. The staple diet is sardines.

Enter Flint Lockwood (voice of Bill Hader) a young man who craves approval. He builds a machine that can transform the water in clouds to meals (Flint explains this scientifically). All Flint has to do is program the machine to make cheeseburgers and there you have them, coming down from the sky, for everyone to eat. And there are other meals to have, just program it.

Yes, food makes Swallows Falls happy. Food makes everyone happy. The problem comes when there is greed and over kill.

Moderation

There have been films and documentaries that deal with the subject of too much in our diet, too much sugar and the overkill of takeaways.  Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs reminds us of how over filled we are with the options.

Where there is too much consumption, there is over kill of stomachs and appetites. In the end the inhabitants of Swallow Falls would sooner crave a simple sardine.

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs gives much creed to the maxim to eating in moderation and not overdoing other things in life.

Overdoing the gifts we have been given can end up with the opposite effect that these gifts were supposed to give. “Dad, I feel sick,” the boy says, after consuming a load fill of ice cream.

The gifts of life are for our benefit, but in moderation.