As someone who really likes to eat, I've often wondered how crazy life would be if food all of a sudden started falling from the sky. That's right, I think about this kind of thing. Usually when I eat. Because I really like food. Did I mention that already?

After reading that Sony Pictures Animation just acquired the film rights to a children's book called Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, I immediately wanted to run out and purchase said book. Set in a world where it rains juice (Yum!) and snows mashed potatoes (Double yum!), the book was illustrated by Judi Barrett and Ron Barrett. The movie's plot is said to surround "a scientist who tries to solve world hunger only to see things go awry as food falls from the sky in abundance."

Meatballs marks the studio's fourth animated pic to go into development, with its first (Open Season) set to hit theaters next month. As of right now, the film will be directed by Phil Lord and Chris Miller.

Sony is wasting no time when it comes to their own animated features, having just green-lit a third film one month before the release of its first. In what was once a field dominated by Pixar and Dreamworks, almost every other studio has since set up shop with their own animation division. Thus, the marketplace is now crowded and those booming box office numbers are no longer a sure thing. (See: The Ant Bully)

Variety reports Hotel Transylvania will mark the third pic for Sony Pictures Animation, whose Open Season debuts next month, followed by Surf's Up in 2007. Directed by Anthony Stacchi and David Feiss, story will re-visit our old friends Frankenstein, The Mummy, Dracula and Werewolf who are holed up in a hotel not far from Transylvania after "21st century technology has seemingly made them irrelevant."

Currently, Sony plans to release the film at some point in 2009, leaving an empty spot available for 2008. According to SPA's (Sony Pictures Animation) Penney Finkelman Cox, there's another project in advanced development that may be ready to bow that year. Personally, I love the Hotel Transylvania idea -- let's hope Open Season and Surf's Up don't tank beforehand.