U • 90 mins • 18 September

Directors: Chris Miller, Phil Lord

Cast: Bill Hader, Anna Faris, Bruce Campbell, James Caan

Rating:

Zinging one-liners, hilarious set-pieces, pin-sharp CGI… you’d be mistaken for thinking Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs was a Pixar movie, but it’s not.

Sony Pictures have stepped up to the (dinner) plate with this reworking of Judi and Ron Barrett’s fascinatingly titled children’s book, which tells the story of Flint (Bill Hader), a nerdy amateur scientist who creates a machine that can make food rain down from the sky. He’s hailed a hero by his town after the resulting precipitation causes everything from ice cream wonderlands to giant jelly castles, but the trouble with hamburgers raining down from the heavens is that you can only do it for so long before storm clouds gather. Cue giant spaghetti tornadoes (“Mamma mia!” gasps Flint at the sight of the twirling pasta) and a gastronomic end-of-the-world scenario. It’s up to Flint and weathergirl Sam (Anna Faris) to stop the disaster, with their attempts thwarted by Bruce Campbell’s fatty bad-guy Mayor.

We could use cheesy food puns all day to sum up this film: a banquet for the eyes, cooked to perfection, mouth-watering... we’re sure you could think of a few more groaners. But it really is as tasty as it sounds. The action gets a little involved towards the end, true, but it’s a small price to pay for a gleaming cast of characters (including Mr T, on fine form as a suspicious cop), glorious visuals and witty jokes that are truly, genuinely funny. It’s rare to find an animated film that hasn’t come out of Pixar’s talented hands which contains so much to gush over, but Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs is something you won’t regret sinking your teeth into. Take some popcorn, though: all that food bouncing out of the screen in 3D will make you hungry.

Jayne Nelson