15 Greatest Food Fights In Movies

Most people think that food is just to stop you from dying of starvation, and while it’s pretty important, there are so many other uses for our delicious food. People use it for art-making, constructing houses, and even powering cars. But there is another, even nobler use: food fighting. When arguments erupt, sometimes the best way to sort the problem out is to fling food at each other’s faces – noble wisdom filmmakers have been aware of for years, which is why we now present the 15 greatest food fights in movies:

15. Problem Child 2 (1991)

Junior and Trixie have discovered a rare common interest: making life miserable for adults. So when they catch sight of Principal Peabody at a pizza restaurant, a peaceful meal is simply not going to happen.

Gilbert Gottfried’s voice could cut through almost any room, but it does little to fend off a faceful of food. Before long, the duo’s assault escalates into a bigger brawl, with pizza and pasta flying across the tables. The poor guy came out for dinner and instead got a whole school day’s worth of grief.

14. It Takes Two (1995)

Most kids begin throwing food around in order to avoid having to eat their lunch. In this instance, there is an entire matchmaking scheme that needs safeguarding.

Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen portray two girls who switch places and attempt to match up their guardians. At camp, the deception is put in jeopardy when Roger and Diane show up in the same room. A single dropped plate earns them a little time, and the dining hall quickly gets involved.

Kirstie Alley offers the children little assistance with their table manners. Her loud demand for a food fight achieves the exact opposite. For once, the grown-ups appear just as eager to create a mess.

13. Max Keeble’s Big Move (2001)

Tell a bullied kid that he’s moving away, and he may begin to believe he can get away with anything. Max carries that idea right into the school lunchroom.

His food fight features the usual flying lunch, but the real attraction is the equipment. Max and his friend Robe convert a tuba and a leaf blower into a mustard sprayer, which is much more effort than most students put into band practice.

12. Hook (1991)

Starting a feast with an empty plate is a pretty sad prospect. That is everything Peter Banning sees when he takes a seat with the Lost Boys, who appear more than content to dig into nothing at all.

Robin Williams portrays Peter as a grown man who has become disconnected from his own imagination. As soon as he begins exchanging insults with Rufio, the food appears, in vivid piles that seem suited to a sweetshop run by kids.

And then they hurl it. The fight finally allows Peter to take part, and it is easy to see why the boys would sooner have him at their table than listen to him talk about work.

11. Heavyweights (1995)

After weeks under Tony Perkis, Ben Stiller’s fitness tyrant, the boys at Camp Hope finally get hold of the junk food he has been withholding from them. It is supposed to be a camp for kids, yet Tony has run the place as if it were his own harsh workout tape.

Once the feast becomes a food fight, no one appears particularly concerned about what Tony might think. The boys have had more than enough of being shouted at. For a time, they get to create the kind of mess that would have had him reaching straight for his whistle.

10. Nanny McPhee (2005)

For much of the film, the Brown children have been repeatedly told to behave. By the time the wedding arrives, they finally have a good reason to do the opposite. Their father is about to marry the awful Mrs. Quickly, and a food fight turns out to be a handy way to ruin the day.

The wedding guests are pulled into the chaos as cakes and desserts fly off their plates. Colin Firth leaves his dignity far behind. You can see the children relishing the rare sight of adults behaving worse than they do, while the fancy clothes take a terrible beating.

9. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009)

Flint Lockwood has the ability to make food fall from the sky. Naturally, someone will begin throwing it right back.

A snowfall of ice cream gives Swallow Falls the ideal excuse for a snowball fight, with scoops replacing packed snow. At first, Flint is nervous. Sam persuades him to join in, and before long he takes his new skill a bit too far.

Here, there’s no need for trays or a pie trolley. The entire town has turned into the dessert course.

8. Fried Green Tomatoes (1991)

Idgie and Ruth are supposed to be getting work done in the kitchen at the Whistle Stop Café. Rather than that, they end up covered in flour and berries when a playful scuffle gets out of hand.

Mary Stuart Masterson and Mary-Louise Parker make the scene feel so relaxed and warm that you nearly forget about the work piling up on the counter. There isn’t a big crowd cheering them on, either. It’s simply two friends cracking each other up, until the sheriff walks in to find out what the racket is and ends up with some of the mess on himself.

7. Whip It (2009)

Roller derby comes with a set of rules. Lunchtime is far more relaxed. A confrontation between Bliss and rival skater Iron Maven escalates from sharp words to flying food, and soon the rest of the room is caught up in it. Elliot Page and Juliette Lewis keep the bad blood clear even as the food fight turns silly. These women already spend their free time knocking each other down, so a quiet chat over a milkshake was never very likely.

Drew Barrymore, who also directs, joins the chaos as Smashley Simpson. Her pie attack fits right in with a team that doesn’t need much of a nudge to start throwing things.

6. Matilda (1996)

Miss Trunchbull has had ample opportunity to frighten the children at Crunchem Hall. Once they summon the courage to fight back, she receives a school lunch she will not soon forget.

Matilda’s powers help shift the balance, but the other pupils are perfectly capable of throwing their own food. They drive the headmistress out using the contents of their packed lunches, and the protest extends past a single classroom.

Best of all, Bruce Bogtrotter gets to plant chocolate cake right in her face. Given that she made him eat an entire cake in front of the whole school, you can hardly fault him for wanting to give a slice back.

5. Meet The Robinsons (2007)

An animated film made by Disney in which the food fight forgoes the classics of custard pies, using meatballs instead.

Done in the style of a kung-fu film complete with bad dubbing and a grainy filter, this is quite possibly the only food fight where people have used martial arts to kick food at each other.

4. Blazing Saddles (1974)

You’d expect all the fights in a film set in the Old West to be fought with guns, not pies. Yet by the time the entire cast has crashed through Warner Bros. studio and onto another film set, it’s clear that all bets are off.

The ensuing food fight is as anarchic as you can get: with cowboys, cavemen, chefs, and even Hitler flinging pies at each other.

3. Bugsy Malone (1976)

A musical about a 1920s gangster played by children, Bugsy Malone is a strange film. The characters all carry around Tommy guns, but these guns fire miniature pies, turning every fight into a food fight. But the best comes near the end when everyone drops their guns and resorts to the old-fashioned way of hurling full-sized pies at each other.

It’s a scene of childhood whimsy, up until you realize that in their universe, they’re essentially throwing grenades at each other. Not such a heartwarming scene now, is it?

This scene may have well caused an outbreak of food brawls in schools everywhere. Bet the filmmakers didn’t consider that, did they?

2. Animal House (1978)

One of the most famous lines from this American comedy about college students is Bluto, played by John Belushi, shouting “food fight!” at the top of his voice.

At his call, the school cafeteria is turned into a crossfire of spaghetti and mashed potatoes. The only one who escapes unscathed is Bluto himself, who runs off to cause more carnage.

1. The Great Race (1965)

Set in the early 1900s, this slapstick comedy has the two great daredevils of the age attempting to prove who is the greater man by driving across the world. When their adventures bring them to a huge kitchen filled with pies and cakes, there’s only one way to resolve things: a food fight. Besides, this wasn’t your run-of-the-mill pie fight – it used up to 4000 pies that cost over $18,000 and took five days to film.

The food brawl was so intense that the actors were often knocked out after being hit in the face with too many pies. With that sort of dedication, The Great Race has to win the top spot.

As you can see, food fights in movies are quite ubiquitous, from the past to the present, from New York to London, bringing fun wherever they appear. It is scientifically proven that the only people who don’t enjoy them are the cleaners left to mop up the leftovers long after the director has wandered off to polish his Oscar shelf. So next time you watch a food film, in between chuckling as someone takes a carrot to the eye, spare a thought for those brave souls whose services make all the tossed pies possible. Can you recall any other memorable food fights in movies after going through our list? Let us know in the comments section below!