Cloudy with a chance of meatballs….not cheesecake (sigh)

The next time it’s cloudy outside look up at the sky and try to imagine it raining meatballs.  Sounds messy, doesn’t it? Normally I love messy. I’m the mom of four boys and believe me, I KNOW messy! But for some reason the falling meatballs in this movie seemed to miss the target. I wanted to like it, I really did. I’ve been going to Disney movies for years but I just couldn’t get into this one.

I realize that just being a nana does not qualify me as a movie critic and you may not agree with this next statement, but in my opinion Disney movies just ain’t what they used to be.

Take for example Little Mermaid. I loved that movie so much that I saw it several times and used the songs with my high school Beta Club. We decorated a banquet room with colored fish hanging from the ceiling and fishnets. I can still see the young girl that played Ariel and the boy who played the prince in their little fake boat as the student chorus sang “Kiss the Girl” behind them.  As far as I am concerned there was magic in the movie Little Mermaid and magic in movies these days is hard to come by.

Meatballs is entertaining. It’s fast paced, 3 D, loud and colorful. My granddaughter is four and a lot of the humor and the story was over her head, but she loved wearing the glasses (and insisted I wear mine). While I am a fan of the book by the same name as the movie, I can’t say that the movie moved me one way or another. I enjoyed being with my granddaughter and I love the premise of food falling from the sky (although I would prefer turtle cheesecake over meatballs).

As the mom of five who range in age from 17 to 27 I have seen my share of Disney movies. Now that I’ve started on the second generation with my granddaughter I find myself missing the magic that Mermaid other past Disney movies have captured. I loved Peter Pan and Jungle Book, but I slept through G-Force. Maybe I’m just having a nostalgia moment, one of those days where everything was more fun and looked better years ago than it does now.

I read some of the reviews from newspapers and other web sites about Meatballs after I wrote my review for NanaHood and I’m definitely in the minority. Other folks seem to like it fine. How about it readers? Two thumbs up or down? Have you taken your children or grandchildren to see it? If so post your opinion here. I’d like to know your thoughts and I would also like to know what your all time favorite Disney movie is. I think you can guess what mine is!