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Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical Parent Guide

With a memorable score, good script and outstanding actors, this is a fun, vivid adaptation of the classic novel..

Theaters: A musical version of the story of Matilda, a brilliant girl trapped in unfortunate circumstances who uses her mind to build a better life. (Coming to Netflix on December 25th.)

Release date December 14, 2022

Run Time: 117 minutes

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The guide to our grades, parent movie review by keith hawkes.

The birth of a first child is a pivotal event – except for Mr. and Mrs. Wormwood (Stephen Graham and Andrea Riseborough). Although Matilda (Alisha Weir) is an uncommonly bright and conscientious child, her parents would rather she disappeared altogether.

Matilda is more than just clever – she’s a genius. Having taught herself to read, she spends her lonely days perusing everything from Charles Dickens to Fyodor Dostoevsky. Once she goes off to school, though, Mr. Wormwood has every confidence that the headmistress, Ms. Trunchbull (Emma Thompson), will make sure Matilda is as miserable as possible. The Trunchbull, as she’s known by the student body, is a massive, domineering woman with all the charm of a prison warden and half the kindness. In contrast, Matilda’s teacher, Ms. Honey (Lashana Lynch) is a wonderful woman who wants nothing more than to nurture and support her students. Ms. Honey is blown away by Matilda’s advanced intellect and hopes to give her more advanced lessons. But the Trunchbull has other ideas…

The feather in the film’s cap is the cast. The last time I saw Lashana Lynch was in The Woman King , and she spent most of her time in the movie screaming and stabbing people. Somehow, she is equally convincing as the softspoken Ms. Honey. And, if you can look past the extensive prosthetics, Emma Thompson is clearly having a little too much fun in her role as the villain of the piece, and it’s contagious. I even like the child actors, who manage to deliver their lines convincingly and learn some complex choreography.

This production is geared at kids, and the content reflects that with no sexual content and only minor profanity. Of course, since this is a Roald Dahl story, it shuns sugary sweetness, and some kids are faced with absolutely insane threats of violence. Chief among these is “The Chokey”, a sort of Iron Maiden the Trunchbull keeps around for discipline. (I’m not sure what mild content you expected here: Dahl had a kid put in a juicer in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. ) But apart from that, parents have very little to worry about – for them or their offspring. Matilda the Musical is one of those rare kids’ films that adults are likely not only to tolerate but even enjoy. There weren’t any children in the theater I attended, and I still heard plenty of laughs.

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Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical Rating & Content Info

Why is Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical rated PG? Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical is rated PG by the MPAA for thematic elements, exaggerated bullying and some language.

Violence: Children are thrown around and threatened with brutal punishment. A woman dies in hospital. Sexual Content: None. Profanity: There are several uses of mild curses. Alcohol / Drug Use: Adult characters are seen pouring drinks, but not actually drinking.

Page last updated January 20, 2024

Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical Parents' Guide

Mrs. Phelps, the librarian, tells Matilda that bullies rely on your silence to win. Who can you tell if you’re being bullied or hurt?

Matilda sings about the importance of being naughty in the right situations. What does she mean by that? Is there such a thing as “good trouble”? In which contexts?

Matilda’s relationship with her parents is difficult, to say the least. How does she end up moving on? What does this say about the importance of family – even if it’s not a family with the people who gave birth to us?

Loved this movie? Try these books…

Roald Dahl wrote many books for children, including Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The Witches, The BFG, The Fantastic Mr. Fox, The Twits, The Magic Finger, Esio Trot, George’s Marvelous Medicine, and James and the Giant Peach .

Related home video titles:

A non-musical American adaptation of Matilda was released in 1996. Other Roald Dahl adaptations include Charlie and the Chocolate Factory , The Witches , The BFG , The Fantastic Mr. Fox , and James and the Giant Peach .

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Roald Dahl was by all accounts a singularly unpleasant person, which may explain why he wrote stories that are so fascinating to children. He nursed the grudges of childhood, he distrusted adults, and he was unmoved by false sentimentality. Kids may not feel cuddled by his books, but they sense Dahl is the real thing: He's writing out of strong emotion, and not just to be cute. Consider the character of Trunchbull, in the darkly comic new film “Matilda.” Trunchbull must be a woman, because she is someone's aunt, but she is never called “Miss”--and we see at once that “Mrs.” would be out of the question. She was a champion shot-putter and hammer-thrower in the 1972 Olympics, we learn, before moving on to her current career as the school principal and dominatrix at Crunchem Hall, a fearsome grade school with the motto: “When you are having fun, you are not learning.” To this school comes the heroine of the story, Matilda Wormwood ( Mara Wilson ), a very, very smart little girl whose parents neglect her when they are not insulting her. Matilda, left at home alone all day, has taught herself to read and walked to the library, where by the time she is 6 she has read not only “Heidi” and “Ivanhoe,” but also “For Whom the Bell Tolls” and “Moby Dick.” When she tells her parents ( Danny DeVito and Rhea Perlman ) she's old enough to go to school, her dad replies: “Nonsense! Who would sign for the packages?” But when he meets the redoubtable Trunchbull he announces that he has at last found the right school for Matilda. Trunchbull, played by Pam Ferris with great zest and well-hidden but genuine humor, is not a nice person. “Sit down, you squirming worm of vomit!” she says to the hapless Matilda at one point, and later calls her “You villainous sack of dog slime!” When a cute little blond girl dares to wearer hair in pigtails, Trunchbull seizes the child by the pigtails, swings her around and hurls her through the air like a hammer in the Olympics--and of course the movie does not neglect to show the girl narrowly miss a spike fence before landing safely in a flower bed. Trunchbull is the kind of villainess children can enjoy, because she is too ridiculous to be taken seriously and yet really is mean and evil, like the witch in “Snow White.” And since most children have at one time or another felt that their parents are not nice enough to them, they may also enjoy the portrait of Matilda's parents. Mr. and Mrs. Wormwood and their older son spend all of their time gobbling food and watching television, and when Matilda says she would rather read, her incredulous father cries, “Read? What do you want to read for when you got a perfectly good TV set right here?” Crunchem Hall is a school that would have appalled Dickens. Children are punished by solitary confinement in a steamy closet with nails sticking through the walls. But redemption comes in the person of a saintly teacher, Miss Honey ( Embeth Davidtz ), who is amazed when little Matilda does difficult math problems in her head, and eventually becomes her guardian and best friend. “Matilda” is not in any sense a “children's movie,” although older children will probably like it a lot. It is a dark family comedy about stupid parents, cruel teachers and a brave little girl, and it is no surprise to find that Danny DeVito not only stars but directed it. Consider that his previous directing credits include “Throw Momma From the Train” and “ The War of the Roses ,” and you sense that he has some kind of deep mordant fascination for dysfunctional families (the family life in his “ Hoffa ” was not exactly functional, either).

There is never a moment (except toward the happy ending) that we sense DeVito is anything other than quite serious about this material. He goes with Dahl’s macabre vision. Whatever it was that hurt Dahl so deeply, he never forgave it, and his children's stories (like “James and the Giant Peach” and “ Charlie and the Chocolate Factory ”) are driven by it. DeVito seems to vibrate on the same wavelength. “Matilda” doesn't condescend to children, it doesn’t sentimentalize, and as a result it feels heartfelt and sincere. It's funny, too.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

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Film credits.

Matilda (1996)

Rated PG For Elements Of Exaggerated Meanness and Ridicule, and For Some Mild Language

100 minutes

Rhea Perlman as Mrs. Wormwood

Danny DeVito as Mr. Wormwood

Pam Ferris as Trunchbul

Embeth Davidtz as Miss Honey

Mara Wilson as Matilda

Directed by

• Danny DeVito
• Nicholas Kazan
• Robin Swicord

Based On The Book by

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• Parents say (85)
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Based on 123 kid reviews

This title has:

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Abusive movie.

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This movie was very good. But sometimes scary.

Pretty crap.

I loved Matilda!! One of my favorites growing up. all I wanted to do when I was little was to repeat the scene of her mom dropping the cereal over, and over, and over again!! What parents need to keep in mind is that the family Matilda is raised in is a bad influence towards young children with the dream of having a family when they are older. The principal says very disgusted things about children calling them smelly, piss worms, mistakes and other horrible things. Harry (Matilda's father) also comes off as an alcoholic. There is something that the principal uses to punish children called the chokey. The chokey is a room with small space for the children and it was filled with sharp nail things. The movie is really good at the end though. Matilda gets adopted by her caring teacher, Miss Honey. Please make sure to talk to your children afterwards saying that the way the Wormwood family treated Matilda and Mikey & how the principal treated the students is not okay at all.

• Too much swearing

sweet, cute, pure, and innocent

DeVito does Dahl in "Matilda," a delightfully twisted fairy tale that artfully juggles broad tomfoolery and sly drollery, along with a generous serving of sight gags enhanced by special effects. Even though it's being pitched primarily at younger moviegoers and their parents, pic is exuberantly quirky enough to please almost anyone.

By Joe Leydon

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DeVito does Dahl in “Matilda,” a delightfully twisted fairy tale that artfully juggles broad tomfoolery and sly drollery, along with a generous serving of sight gags enhanced by special effects. Even though it’s being pitched primarily at younger moviegoers and their parents, pic is exuberantly quirky enough to please almost anyone. Indeed, “Matilda” has definite sleeper potential, and could very well outgross many more highly publicized and star-studded summer releases. Ancillary prospects are even brighter.

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Director and co-producer Danny DeVito has remained faithful to the subversive spirit of the late Roald Dahl’s popular children’s novel about a little girl who uses her formidable intelligence — and her telekinetic powers — to triumph over stupid and/or sinister adults. There has been very little effortto homogenize the edgy source material.

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The title heroine, played with impressive self-assurance by Mara Wilson (“Miracle on 34th Street”), is an extraordinarily bright child who has had to fend for herself practically since birth. Neither her larcenous car-dealer father, Harry (DeVito), nor her crassly self-absorbed mother, Zinnia (Rhea Perlman), has any time for Matilda. And things only get worse when Matilda is enrolled at the hellacious Crunchem Hall, an oppressively bleak school operated by the fearsome Agatha Trunchbull (Pam Ferris).

DeVito and screenwriters Nicholas Kazan and Robin Swicord have transported Dahl’s story from England to California, no doubt hoping to make it more “accessible” to U.S. moviegoers. (A few bits of slangy dialogue from Dahl’s original — “You lying little earwig!” — sound jarring in this Americanized context.) Fortunately, the filmmakers have preserved enough of the novel’s mischievous wit and straight-faced absurdism so that the change of setting has relatively little effect.

Right from the start, DeVito and his collaborators hit the right note of comic exaggeration, so that audiences will not be unduly upset by a comedy that, on a very basic level, is a story of child neglect. Matilda is smart enough to start cooking her own meals while still a toddler. By the age of 3, she is reading newspapers and magazines. In no time at all, she is devouring Dickens, Melville and other great authors while her parents and older brother (Brian Levinson) are glued to their TV.

Trouble is, none of this impresses her parents. The one time Matilda works up the nerve to ask her father to buy her a book, he explodes, “There is nothing you can’t get from a book that you can’t get from television faster!””Matilda” is an extremely funny comedy, but it has a poignant undercurrent that should not be ignored or underestimated.

At Crunchem Hall, the violence is as much physical as psychological. Here, too, DeVito wisely overstates the case. When the hulking Miss Trunchbull grabs a bothersome little girl by her pigtails, spins her around, then tosses her over a fence and into a nearby flower garden, the scene is as stylized as a Tex Avery cartoon (or DeVito’s own “Throw Momma From the Train”). And yet, for all that, Miss Trunchbull remains the most terrifying headmaster to stalk a schoolyard since Wackford Squeers in “Nicholas Nickleby.” DeVito wants to have it both ways , and he succeeds remarkably well.

As she begins to appreciate the full extent of her telekinetic abilities, Matilda learns to stand up for herself. At first, she is content to make life unpleasant for her dad. But then Matilda befriends her first-grade schoolteacher , Miss Honey (Embeth Davidtz), the first adult to treat her with love and respect. When Miss Honey reveals some unpleasant details about her past dealings with Miss Trunchbull, Matilda launches a plan to avenge her new friend — while having some naughty fun in the bargain.

Wilson is charming as Matilda, particularly during a key scene in which she makes various objects dance around a room to the tune of “Little Bitty Pretty One.” Davidtz adds just a slight touch of ditziness to her performance as Miss Honey, so that the character isn’t just a goody-two-shoes.

Davidtz even manages to hold her own in scenes opposite Ferris’ marvelously menacing Miss Trunchbull. With her imposing girth and her vaguely fascist-style uniform, Ferris strikes dim echoes of Shirley Stoler’s concentration camp commander in Lina Wertmuller’s “Seven Beauties.”

In addition to DeVito and Perlman, who are deliciously sleazy, supporting players of note include Kiami Davael and Kira Spencer Hesser as Matilda’s best friends at school, and Paul Reubens and Tracey Walter as FBI agents who are very interested in Harry’s business activities.

As a director, DeVito once again proves to be an audacious stylist with an extravagant visual flair. With the invaluable assistance of production designer Bill Brzeski, cinematographer Stefan Czapsky and costumer Jane Ruhm, he manages to create a world that is slightly larger and considerably funnier than life. It is a joy to visit.

• Production: A Sony Pictures Entertainment release from TriStar Pictures of a Jersey Films production. Produced by Danny DeVito, Michael Shamberg, Stacey Sher, Liccy Dahl. Executive producers, Michael Peyser, Martin Bregman. Directed by Danny DeVito. Screenplay, Nicholas Kazan, Robin Swicord, based on the novel by Roald Dahl.
• Crew: Camera (Technicolor), Stefan Czapsky; editors, Lynzee Klingman, Brent White; music, David Newman; production design, Bill Brzeski; art direction, Philip Too Lin; set design, Sharon Alshams, Andrew Neskormomny, Barbara Mesney; costume design, Jane Ruhm; sound (Dolby SDDS), David Kelson; visual effects supervisor, Chris Watts; assistant director, Cara Giallanza; casting, David Rubin, Renee Rousselot. Reviewed at TriStar Screening Room, L.A., July 12, 1996. MPAA Rating: PG. Running time: 93 MIN.
• With: Matilda Wormwood - Mara Wilson Mr. Wormwood - Danny DeVito Mrs. Wormwood - Rhea Perlman Miss Honey/Miss Honey's Mother - Embeth Davidtz Trunchbull - Pam Ferris FBI Agents - Paul Reubens, Tracey Walter Michael - Brian Levinson Hortensia - Kira Spencer Hesser Lavender - Kiami Davael

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Where to Watch

Watch Matilda with a subscription on Netflix, rent on Fandango at Home, Prime Video, Apple TV, or buy on Fandango at Home, Prime Video, Apple TV.

What to Know

Danny DeVito-directed version of Matilda is odd, charming, and while the movie diverges from Roald Dahl, it nonetheless captures the book's spirit.

Critics Reviews

Audience reviews, cast & crew.

Danny DeVito

Mara Wilson

Matilda Wormwood

Harry Wormwood

Rhea Perlman

Zinnia Wormwood

Embeth Davidtz

Jennifer "Jenny" Honey

Agatha Trunchbull

Movie Clips

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Matilda (United States, 1996)

Arriving in the latter half of the summer, Danny DeVito's Matilda beats out such worthy contenders as The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Harriet the Spy for best family fare of the season. In fact, I haven't enjoyed a so-called "children's film" this much since last year's Babe or Toy Story . Although Matilda , which is based on a story by Roald Dahl (whose James and the Giant Peach reached screens earlier this year), is primarily aimed at the under-10 crowd, DeVito has crammed this movie with elements designed to appeal to adults. The result is a highly-satisfactory black comedy/fantasy that will find fans of all ages.

Matilda contains numerous elements of traditional fairy tales - a wicked step-aunt, a true friend with a pure heart, and more than a little magic - but "traditional" is about the last word that comes to mind when describing this quirky film. DeVito, whose previous efforts include the viciously wacky War of the Roses , is in fine form here, exaggerating characters and situations to the point where they lose their more terrifying edge without going so far that we no longer care about any of the inhabitants of this world. It's a fine line to walk, but Matilda rarely falters.

The basic material may seem odd for a family film, dealing as it does with issues of child neglect, abuse, and revenge. By removing the story from conventional reality, however, DeVito pulls it off. This is a world where adults (except two) are bad and children (except one) are good. It's a place where television is a force of mind-numbing evil and where books represent escape and solace. And, most importantly, empowerment is genuine, not just a slogan.

Matilda (Mara Wilson) is the youngest child, and only daughter, of Harry and Zinia Wormwood (Danny DeVito and Rhea Perlman), who are described as living "in a very nice neighborhood in a very nice house", but not being very nice people. Mr. Wormwood is a used car salesman with the police tracking his every move, and Mrs. Wormwood is obsessed with bingo parlors and television game shows. Both parents are extremely neglectful of their little six-and-one-half year old daughter, even though she shows signs of amazing intelligence and various remarkable powers (she and John Travolta's character in Phenomenon could have long, meaningful discussions).

Eventually, Mr. Wormwood notices his daughter long enough to send her off to Crunchem Hall, an elementary school lorded over by the ogre-like Miss Trunchbull (Pam Ferris), whose motto is "Use the rod, beat the child." She practices what she preaches, taking delight in punishing her charges and informing them mercilessly that her idea of a perfect school is one where there are no children. Fortunately for Matilda, her first grade teacher, Miss Honey (Embeth Davidtz), is kind and good-hearted, and immediately recognizes her new student's amazing gifts.

Mara Wilson, who lit up the screen as Robin Williams' daughter in Mrs. Doubtfire , and captured the Natalie Wood role in the remake of A Miracle on 34th Street , is enchanting without being either sickeningly adorable or unbearably irritating. She has a natural charisma, and seems the perfect choice for the perky, indomitable Matilda. Wilson causes us to care about the title character, and that identification is necessary to Matilda 's success. It's rare for an actor this young to give such a polished performance.

DeVito and his wife, Rhea Perlman, are effective in their cartoonish roles. Embeth Davidtz ( Feast of July ) radiates sweetness and vulnerability. And Pam Ferris takes on the Herculean role of Trunchbull by sinking her teeth into it and going as far over-the-top as the director lets her (which, in most cases, is pretty far). She reminded me forcefully of Ursula from Disney's animated The Little Mermaid . Meanwhile, Paul Reubens (aka Pee-Wee Herman) has a cameo as one of the cops shadowing Harry Wormwood.

Matilda is not politically correct - it is, after all, a pint-sized revenge fantasy - but, in this case, that's a definite plus. Besides, for those who want bland, "wholesome" family entertainment, there's always Disney. Children aren't likely to understand much of the black comedy and satire here, but they'll be so involved in the story that they won't notice that a lot is going over their heads. Hardly a moment of Matilda can be described as either juvenile or condescending, and, compared with many of this summer's so-called "mature" features, that makes for a delightfully refreshing change-of-pace.

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The Parents' Guide To What They're Watching

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Matilda review

We review matilda - a rare family movie that is just as appealing to adults as to the kids it’s supposed to be aimed at.

Certificate: 12A

Starring: Danny DeVito, Rhea Perlman, Mara Wilson

Release date: 1996

It’s a rare family movie that is just as appealing to adults as to the kids it’s supposed to be aimed at. Matilda , based on Roald Dahl’s classic tale, is such a film, thanks in great part to Danny DeVito’s spot-on direction and a winning central performance from eight-year-old Mara Wilson in the title role.

Matilda is an incredibly intelligent but lonely little girl in love with books and learning, who is unfortunately cursed with two coarse, dim-witted TV-addicted parents, Harry (DeVito) and Zinnia Wormwood (DeVito’s real-life wife Perlman). After much pleading on Matilda’s part, they finally let her attend school, but they send her to the sinister Crunchem Hall, run by forbidding, child-hating principal Agatha Trunchbull (Pam Ferris). But with the help of loveable young teacher Miss Honey (Embeth Davidtz), Matilda is soon turning the tables on all the horrible old adults, and uncovering her own special talent, which helps her to turn her dreary life into something much more fun.

The idea of a child being smarter and more cunning than her parents will appeal to junior audiences, while adults will get a kick out of the sassy, grown-up humour and wickedly funny performances from DeVito, Perlman and especially an hilariously over-the-top Pam Ferris. In the director’s chair, DeVito keeps the action tight, never allowing the film to be overwhelmed by too many special effects or exaggerated performances. As delicious as Dahl’s original work, this is one fantasy that kids and grown-ups still in touch with the naughty child inside them will want to buy into.

Is Matilda suitable for kids? Here are our parents’ notes...

Younger viewers may be scared by ‘The Chokey’, where children are locked by Miss Trunchbull. They also may not understand the over-the-top cartoon style violence, so may be scared by it. One for the over-8s.

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If you like this, why not try: Nanny McPhee, Madeline, Anne Of Green Gables, Racing Stripes, James And The Giant Peach,

Tags: Anne of Green Gables , Danny DeVito , James And The Giant Peach , Madeline , Mara Wilson , Matilda , Nanny McPhee , Racing Stripes , Rhea Perlman

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Roald Dahl’s Matilda Review

01 Jan 1996

Roald Dahl’s Matilda

Matilda is a blackly comic, delightfully off-the-wall picture that both kids and adults will lap up. The titular Matilda (Wilson) is the child genius born into a family of no-hopers, headed by crooked car salesman pop (DeVito) and flirtatious, white trash mom (Rhea Perlman). Left to her own devices from an early age, Matilda is soon digesting the entire contents of the local library, discovering latent telekinetic powers and whipping up culinary masterpieces in the kitchen even though she has to stand on a chair to reach the work surfaces.

Her folks, on the other hand, are less convinced of their daughter's talents and pack her off to Crunchem Hall, a nightmarish school headed by the sadistic Miss Trunchbull (Ferris). It's here that Matilda's abilities really come to the fore, her brain power attracting the attention of sickly sweet schoolmarm-with-secret Miss Honey (Embeth Davidtz), and her object-flinging tendencies exacting horrible payback on the headmistress from hell.

In the wrong hands, this could have been an overblown mess, but thankfully there's taut, clever direction at work here, DeVito weaving hilariously twisted set-pieces (a nail-gnawing trek through the Trunchbull residence, a cake-scoffing marathon guaranteed to make even chocoholics lay down their Mars bars) and scrupulous attention to detail around this fantastical whimsy of a story.

In fact, this is exactly how you would expect a jaunt into Dahl's work to look — all kitsch chintzy furniture skewed overhead camera angles making everybody look enormous of bonce and gaudily-attired, larger than life characters. DeVito and Perlman excel Ferris is a menacing hoot, but the real lynchpin here is the endearing Wilson proving after Miracle On 34th Street that she is one of the few child actor: who really can deliver the goods.

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(Pa, B, O, V, A, D, M) Pagan worldview with moral elements encouraging reading, learning and friendship and discouraging child neglect with elements of telekinesis and extraordinary powers & a portrayal of parents as stupid; no obscenities or profanities but lots of name calling; many scary scenes including threats to children, woman spin girl by hair & throws girl, woman throws boy out window, woman kicks cat, threats to lock-up children, & threats with a whip; no sex; no nudity; brief alcohol use; smoking by disreputable parents; and, spitting & punishing child by force-feeding him until he almost vomits

More Detail:

The next adaptation of a Roald Dahl book is MATILDA. Matilda Wormwood is a six-year old girl of great intelligence. Her parents send her to school at the terrible Crunchem Hall, operated by the fearsome Agatha Trunchbull , who abuses the children. Matilda’s kind-hearted teacher Miss Honey, stands quietly by, unable to do anything about the cruelty. Matilda discovers that she has the power to move objects with her mind. As her parents neglect her and Ms. Trunchbull abuses her and her classmates, Matilda begins to execute a plan highlighting her powers which will teach all the stupid and mean adults a lesson.

Director Danny DeVito crafts an artistic and stylistic story about child neglect, child abuse, learning, love, and regrettably magic. Little children will be scared by Ms. Trunchbull . Her cruelty can be unrelenting. Many parents will be concerned about the portrayal of parents as stupid and the use of telekinetic powers in the movie. Matilda makes it appear that a deceased person from Ms. Trunchbull’s past will come back and haunt her, if she doesn’t leave the school. If she was so smart, she could have thought up a plan without floating objects or ghost threats. It is an intelligent movie, more intense than HARRIET THE SPY, and similar to JAMES IN THE GIANT PEACH in mood and creativity.

Matilda Review: A Deliciously Dark Revenge Tale With A Sweet Center [London Film Festival]

Director Matthew Warchus had quite a mountain to climb with " Matilda " (or, to use its full title, "Roald Dahl's Matilda the Musical"). Not only is the film an adaptation of one of the most beloved British children's books of all time, it's directly adapted from a musical based on the book. Debuting in 2011, with Warchus also directing the original stage production, "Matilda the Musical" was written by Dennis Kelly with music and lyrics by comedian/songwriter Tim Minchin. 

Movie musicals have had a patchy record of success over the past decade or so (admittedly not helped by Tom Hooper throwing off the curve), and getting general audiences onboard with characters bursting into song is always a bit of an obstacle. Add in the fact that the cast of this particular musical is predominantly made up of children, and finding good child actors is hard enough without also requiring them to be able to sing and dance. Oh, and there's already a movie adaptation of this particular book that many consider to be the definitive version. With all those challenges in the way, it would take a miracle to make "Matilda" work.

Fortunately, miracles happen to be Matilda Wormwood's (Alisha Weir) speciality. The fierce young lead, backed by a delightful and talented ensemble of young performers, brings the spirit of Roald Dahl's beleaguered young protagonist to life in a film that has all the sharp edges and dark corners that made Dahl's writing such a treat.

Meet the Wormwoods

A common tactic in children's stories, to free up the young hero for both adventure and peril, is to take one or both biological parents out of the picture. The protagonist might be an orphan raised by a benevolent grandparent or a malevolent stepmother, or they might have been stolen away from their real parents as a child, or they might temporarily run away from home. But however it happens, they usually end up fending for themselves in one way or another. After all, how much trouble can a child get into while they still have loving parents around to keep an eye out for them? 

Dahl himself contributed to the orphan trend with several of his books, but "Matilda" presents a much rarer (and sadly more realistic) scenario: Matilda's mother and father are alive, and she lives with them, but they're terrible people and even worse parents. Mrs. Wormwood (Andrea Riseborough, delightfully hamming it up beneath a mass of hair extensions and animal prints) discovers to her surprise and disgust that she is pregnant, comically oblivious to her beachball-sized stomach, on the day that Matilda is delivered. Mr. Wormwood (Stephen Graham) is offended by the fact that the surprise baby is not, as the balloons he brought to the hospital declare, a boy, and treats Matilda's existence as a personal insult.

Lamenting their misfortune as the other new parents around them celebrate their precious bundles of joy in the grand opening number, "Miracle," the Wormwoods reluctantly take their unwanted baby home. The film doesn't sugarcoat life in the Wormwood house: Matilda lives in a dingy attic room, raised mostly by books. Her mother talks about her like she's an inanimate object ("you forgot to send it to school!" she berates Mr. Wormwood when an inspector shows up at their home) and her father, having decided to take the opinion of his balloons over the opinion of the maternity ward doctor, steadfastly insists on referring to Matilda as a boy. 

Carrie for kids

The students of Crunchem Hall are in agreement with their monstrous headmistress on one thing: the children are revolting. "Matilda" is not a story about a sad little girl passively waiting to be rescued from her miserable life; it's fundamentally about the joy of rebellion and revenge. Throw in some telekinetic powers that emerge from Matilda being trapped in a situation where her preternatural intelligence is never really challenged, and "Matilda" is basically "Carrie" for kids. Young lead Alisha Weir is at her best when Matilda becomes possessed by the spirit of revenge, and once she masters her powers, there are nods to Brian de Palma's 1976 adaptation of the Stephen King novel in extreme close-ups of Matilda's maliciously squinting eyes.

Of her two parents, Mr. Wormwood is the only one who really acknowledges her as a human being — and this recognition comes in the form of bullying and mistreatment. This kicks off the silent war between Matilda and her father as she takes petty revenge by dyeing his hair green and sticking his hat to his head with superglue. 

Matilda is counseled by friendly mobile librarian Mrs. Phelps (Sindhu Vee) that two wrongs don't make a right, and it's best to be the better person, turn the other cheek etc. Refreshingly, both Matilda and "Matilda" reject this message. As our young heroine points out in her first solo number, "Naughty," she is not Cinderella and there's no fairy godmother coming to wave a magic wand and fix all of her problems if she just stays patient and virtuous. Passivity in a protagonist is boring to watch, but Matilda further argues that to experience oppression without retaliation is to be complicit: "If you always take it on the chin and wear it/You might as well be saying you think that it's okay." 

It's a subversive message, but given the current state of the world and everything that kids Matilda's age have already lived through, it might be the message they need right now. Who could blame the current generation of children for thinking that grown-ups are more likely to ignore problems — or make them worse — than do anything to fix them? The total lack of parental support throughout her young life has taught Matilda that "nobody else is going to put it right for me" and, well, she's not wrong. While the timid, sweet-natured teacher Miss Honey (Lashana Lynch) tries to shield her students from the worst of Crunchem Hall, ultimately it's up to Matilda to save the day.

Meet the maggots

Though there's plenty of prestige in the grown-up cast, the true stars of "Matilda" are the kids, with a tremendous young ensemble cast backing the movie's miniature Spartacus. Ellen Kane, the choreographer for the original "Matilda the Musical" stage show, returned to oversee the dance numbers for the movie. It must have taken an exhausting number of rehearsals to achieve, but the ensemble of "Matilda" move in perfect synchronicity, like the cogs in the machine that Crunchem Hall is determined to turn them into. Among the supporting cast of kids, Meesha Garbett is a standout in a small role as Crunchem's resident bad girl and detention veteran Hortensia, who delights in describing the worst horrors that the school has to offer.

Crunchem Hall itself is something straight out of a horror movie (or a certain Pink Floyd music video ). Costume clues point to "Matilda" being set some time in the 1980s, but the combination of corporal punishment and a rigid focus on discipline draw up from the roots of Roald Dahl's own childhood. After experiencing his first caning at the tender age of eight, Dahl was sent away to boarding school, where such beatings were a routine tool of discipline. "All through my school life I was appalled by the fact that masters and senior boys were allowed literally to wound other boys, and sometimes quite severely," he wrote in his memoir . "I couldn't get over it. I never have got over it."

So while the punishments doled out by Miss Trunchbull (Emma Thompson) in "Matilda" are cartoonish — picking a girl up by her pigtails to throw her like her a hammer, picking a boy up by his ears, and forcing poor Bruce Bogtrotter (Charlie Hodson-Prior) to consume a dangerous amount of chocolate cake — there is a genuine sense of outrage in the film. Rather than softening the edges of Dahl's work, "Matilda" goes even darker in its depiction of the dreaded "Chokey," an unholy hybrid of solitary confinement and an iron maiden , whose shadow looms over the children of Crunchem as one of the most brutal tools in Trunchbull's arsenal.

The misguided casting of Miss Trunchbull

Yes, what about Miss Trunchbull? If it seems like the main villain of "Matilda" has gotten little mention in this review, it's because ... well, there isn't much to write about. "Matilda" joins the current trend where, in lieu of casting character actors with striking or unusual looks, Hollywood simply takes a conventionally attractive star and sticks prosthetics all over their face in an effort to try and make it more interesting. Add in the armor of a body suit to try and build up her physique, and Emma Thompson is scarcely visible. The lower half of her face is largely frozen by an artificial jawline, and her physicality is limited by the padding. It's not Thompson's fault (this film is a waste of her considerable talents), but there's no question that Pam Ferris is still the definitive Miss Trunchbull.

Still, Trunchbull still works well enough as a monster, in the same way that the mechanical T-rex in "Jurassic Park" did. She lumbers around Crunchem Hall like a bulldozer, the sound design adding booming footsteps and camera angles accenting her towering size. In a particularly memorable piece of choreography, the children have to hastily drag their tables out of the way when she strides across the cafeteria because she refuses to walk around them. Thompson also gets a couple of good villain songs, including one that reveals Trunchbull to be basically a horse girl on steroids (possibly literally).

The real heart of "Matilda," as it was in the book and in the 1996 film, is the relationship between Matilda and Miss Honey. Lynch's impressive singing voice brings to life the musical's sweeter songs, which are a necessary balance for the relentless peril of the story and the nastiness of most of the other grown-ups. Miss Honey's own miserable childhood is revealed as a parallel to Matilda's, though instead of open rebellion, she found quieter ways to carve out a place for herself in the world. The bond between the two characters, and the manner in which they end up rescuing each other, will doubtless have a few audience members shedding tears.

With lush, fun cinematography, creative staging, and some true powerhouse music and dance numbers, the strengths of "Matilda" more than make up for its weaknesses. Here's to the children of the revolution.

/Film rating: 8 out of 10

Matilda (1996) Values the Brilliance of Children

I had never seen Matilda until this week, which is difficult to imagine considering my daytime job is working with children. I don’t know how the movie got past me as a child, but I’m almost happier that I got to see it for the first time as an adult. The film has a love and appreciation for kids that I don’t think I would have understood at a young age, though I definitely understand it now.

During the day (at a time not during the pandemic) I work at an after-school program where kids get to take a different art class each day of the week. Childcare is a field I definitely fell into as I gained more experience, but it’s a part of my life that I now greatly value. What first surprised me about kids when I went from working with high school students to elementary students was how smart they were, all on their own. Our program starts with pre-k students, who are all around age four, and already they were doing projects on their own and knew so much about the world around them. I am constantly in awe of their capabilities and their capacity for empathy towards each other. Matilda captures this so perfectly within a world that is brutal to all of the children involved.

Young Matilda is a sharp six and a half, though her parents neglect her so much that they believe she is still four. She teaches herself to walk to the library and with a little nudge from the staff, she brings home all her literary treasures in a child-sized red wagon. She spends her days devouring the books despite the disapproval of her cruel family who are too self-involved to care for their own child. Matilda gathers up the strength and ability to care for herself before she even discovers that she has supernatural powers. The movie goes out of its way to consistently remind the audience that we should care about Matilda in a way that her parents never could. It is heartbreaking to see them tear her apart and deny her intelligence, even though she consistently proves to us that she is in the right. 

When she is finally allowed to start school, she is greeted with even more horror at the hands of the principal Miss Trunchbull who hates children. Watching these adults so grossly harm children was deeply upsetting! Children are exactly what they are: children. The cruelty from Miss Trunchball and the Wormwood family is out of their own self-contempt and perfectly preventable, as shown in the example of Miss Honey. No matter the circumstances that lead to these figures who take their own frustrations out on innocent children, there are no excuses for their treatment that will inevitably result in permanent damage that they will need to cope with later in life.

Miss Honey is quite the opposite of all the other figures in Matilda’s life: she shows her students kindness and values their intellect, despite her own tragic upbringing. She uses creative methods to teach her students math and spelling and encourages them to use their powers to change the world. Matilda discovers that she has telekinetic powers that she can control when angered by the abuse of her family and principal. She tells Miss Honey about her powers and secret and even though Miss Honey regards this as an invention of Matilda’s mind, she still tells her to believe in her own powers. 

Miss Honey and Matilda form a mutually beneficial bond where they help each other in breaking free from the trauma of their past. Miss Honey tells Matilda about her upbringing where her father was killed and she was raised by her aunt, Miss Trunchball. Matilda is appalled and sets her sights on reclaiming a new life for Miss Honey, the one she should have been given after the death of her father. In the end, Matilda uses her powers to scare Miss Trunchball into returning Miss Honey’s childhood home to her and passing over the school into her power. Miss Honey returns the favor in adopting Matilda, taking her away from her horrific parents.

This movie filled me with pure, wholesome joy and I get the hype that has always surrounded it. There is great power in allowing children to be their brightest selves and trusting them with their own abilities. The only way to really nurture young people is to give them the power to think and act for themselves, just as we do adults. This doesn’t mean that they don’t need guidance, but the more we allow them to express who they are and who they want to be, the more likely it is that they will grow into adults with empathy for others and a strong sense of self. 

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Movie Review: Matilda (1996)

Review: This movie sounds serious, but it’s actually quite funny. Danny DeVito directs and acts–both as the narrator and Matilda’s father.  Rhea Perlman, known like DeVito for comedic roles, plays Matilda’s mother. Matilda’s telekinetic abilities are played mainly for laughs, and she tends to use them in a child-like manner.

Matilda’s parents aren’t mean to their daughter on purpose; they just don’t understand her. They think it’s fun to watch terrible game shows on tv and are offended when she says she’d rather read Moby Dick . Matilda doesn’t hate them, but she also knows she doesn’t belong.

The message of the movie really is that family is what you make of it, not what you’re born into. Matilda could have dumbed herself down to fit in with her family, but she doesn’t. Her parents could have insisted that she belongs with them, but they don’t.  Sometimes people are born into the right family; sometimes they’re not, and there’s nothing wrong with fixing that.

If you want some giggles and a heartwarming message that doesn’t have a love interest for once, give Matilda a shot.

If you found this review helpful, please consider  tipping me on ko-fi , checking out my  digital items available  in my ko-fi shop, buying one of  my publications , or using one of my  referral/coupon codes .  Thank you for your support!

4 out of 5 stars

Source: Netflix

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This used to be the ultimate film when I was a little girl, especially as I loved Roald Dahl!

It’s a whole new experience for me, as I wasn’t allowed to read Roald Dahl or watch movies based on his works (except for Willy Wonka that is).

I loved this book and all I remember about the movie was annoyance that they Americanized everything. I didn’t see why they’d done it and it irritated me that they thought kids were stupid enough to not relate to a film just because it was set in England.

Hah! You must not be pleased by the new Torchwood news then, eh?

I don’t watch Torchwood, so I don’t know! Keith isn’t a fan of Doctor Who + spinoffs and I never really had cause to start watching on my own.

I, too, found this movie to be wonderfully cute and warming. Seeing Danny DeVito play the horrible father I so vilified in my mind as a child- I absolutely adored it. Thanks for the review and, yes, it’s nice to see a movie that doesn’t focus on adult relationships (or adult-type relationships).

Thanks for the review!

You’re welcome! Thank you for taking the time to read it. Glad to have brought back mostly happy childhood memories for some folks.

I absolutely love this movie and this book. Such awesome childhood memories — now I want to go home and watch it!

It is on Netflix Instant if you’re a subscriber!

Meghan–Apparently they’re making an American version of Torchwood, just like they did of The Office.

Oh man, fantastic movie! Although, imho, nowhere near as good as the mind-blowing book.

Oh of course not! When is the movie *ever* as good as the book? 😛

i always look for a good movie review first before watching new movies ::

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Screen Rant

9 harsh realities of rewatching matilda, 28 years later.

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Roald Dahl Movie With 92% On RT That's Now On Netflix Is A Big Reminder To Watch This $35M Movie From 2 Years Ago

8 reasons matilda bombed at the box office: examining the childhood favorite's $33m failure, 10 '90s comfort movies to watch if you're having a bad day.

• Matilda is neglected by her parents, highlighting a harsh reality.
• Matilda's father engages in criminal activities with potential fatal consequences.
• Matilda's powers make her terrifying, hinting at a potentially dark future.

Matilda is a classic family film, but one that quietly has some harsh aspects that stand out in retrospect. Directed by Danny Devito (who also appears in the film as Matilda's father Harry Wormwood), Matilda focuses on the titular little girl. Brilliant beyond her years but ignored by a largely uncaring world, Matilda finds herself defending herself, her friends, and her teacher Miss Honey from the villainous school principal, Ms Trunchbull. The 1996 movie version of the Roald Dhal book of the same name, Matilda is a sweet story that retains much of the author's sneaky and subversive leanings.

However, there are some aspects of the film that retain are a lot harsher when viewed through a modern adult lense. This extends to the implied failings of the adults around Matilda, the abuses that have been heaped on her and those around her, and the potentially dangerous capabilities of Matilda's powers given her origins . While these aspects don't take away from the beloved children's movie, they do highlight the surprisingly lethal stakes and darker aspects of the story that young audiences didn't pick up on when they were watching it the first time.

Netflix recently added a classic movie from 1996 to its roster, and rewatching it will be a good reminder to check out its more recent adaptation.

9 Matilda Is Criminally Neglected By Her Parents — And The Authorities Don't Care

The authorities should be trying to help matilda, not ignoring her.

One of the key elements of Matilda is the way she's neglected by her family, which highlights a very harsh reality in retrospect. For much of the film, Matilda's father Harry is shown to be under surveillance by the authorities due to his criminal business activities. This means the entire family is being monitored, allowing Matilda to even trick them at one point. However, this suggests that the authorities are also witnessing the neglect Matilda is going through, and do nothing about it .

This could be explained as the FBI not wanting to give themselves away by alerting child services. However, that would mean they've reasoned the criminal neglect Matilda is put through is worth it for a chance to bring down her father. The alternative is that the FBI just doesn't care enough to get involved, which would make sense given how many adults in Matilda don't seem all that bothered by child endangerment.

8 Matilda's Father Is A Criminal Menace (And May Have Gotten People Killed)

Harry wormwood's thrifty tactics might have gotten people killed.

The reason Harry Wormwood is under surveillance by the authorities is for his illegal business practices as a car salesman. In the context of the film, it's used to highlight Michael's flaws as a person and draw a more stark contrast to how Matilda and Ms. Hunny act. However, it's worth noting that Harry's actions may have more grisly repercussions. Because Harry sells defective cars, they suffer mechanical problems. Trunchbull complains to Matilda about the annoyances this caused her, but it's possible that Harry's actions might have led other motorists to have more fatal accidents .

This would explain why the FBI is so invested in bringing him down instead of just relying on the police, suggesting they view his crimes as a federal offense. This would also explain why he's so insistent on fleeing the country at the end of the film , as he may be facing some serious consequences for his crimes. Harry might quietly have a lot more blood on his hands than the movie indicates.

7 Matilda's Brother Is A Victim Of Their Parents Too

Played by Brian Levinson, Matilda's brother Michael is portrayed as much of a bully as their parents. This allows him to be the target of some slapstick in the film, and further underscore just how different Matilda is from the rest of her family. However, while their parents are fully aware of how cruel they can be, Michael is just a child. He's learned how to act through watching his parents , suggesting that his cruelty towards his sister is an extension of his parents' treatment of her.

It's entirely possible that he's only picking on her to fit in with his parents. M ichael may have even once shown the same promise as Matilda, but was browbeat into acting more like his parents to avoid their wraith. In that sense, Michael is also a victim of Harry and Zinnia's terrible parenting, and going on the run with them at the end of the movie might just make him worse.

1996's Matilda is a classic children's film, but the beloved Roald Dahl adaptation actually was a box office bomb due to these eight factors.

6 Ms. Trunchbull's Actress Was Repeatedly Injured On Set

By all accounts, Danny Devito was a very thoughtful director on the set of Matilda and worked to ensure the cast were well taken care of. However, even under the best of circumstances, film production can have all sorts of challenges and accidents. This is exactly what happened to Pam Ferris, who played Trunchbull. As Ferris revealed during an interview with Radio Times , Ferris was repeatedly injured while filming Matilda . During the scene where Trunchbull is attacked by erasers, Ferris got so much chalk dust in her eye that she required multiple hospital visits to get her eyes flushed.

The worst injury that happened to Ferris occurred while filming the scene where Trunchbull throws Amanda Thripp by her pigtails. To film the scene, a harness was attached to Amanda's actress and Ferris' fingers. Unfortunately, the natural centrifugal force caused by the shot almost ripped off one of Ferris' fingers , resulting in her getting several stitches. Ferris still looks back fondly on the production of the film, but it's a reminder that even the best sets can have their share of troubles.

5 Miss Honey's Backstory Is Genuinelly Horrifying

Jennifer Honey is one of Matilda 's few noble adults, who strives to protect her students and shield them from the abuses of Ms. Trunchbull. This is revealed to be partly because Miss Honey is firmly aware of how horrifying Trunchbull can be, as she's the principal's niece and was raised by her after the death of her father. However, these little details highlight just how harrowing Miss Honey's backstory really was . Her father's death is heavily implied to have been caused by Trunchbull, who claimed his fortune and home after his death.

Her abusive treatment of Jennifer was apparently harsh enough that she broke one of Jennifer's arms and seemingly faced no consequences for her actions. Even as an adult, Jennifer remains under Trunchbull's thumb until Matilda helps her finally break free. Jennifer Honey has a quietly terrifying story in Matilda , which at least has a happy ending.

4 The Local Community Has Accepted Ms. Trunchbull

One of the harshest elements about Ms. Trunchbull is the way she's seemingly accepted by the world around her . Trunchbull is a vicious educator who relishes in torutring her students. Despite this, none of the parents of the students under her care seem to mind all that much. The best case scenario is that all of them are unaware of what Ms. Trunchbull does, and that the villainous principal simply hides her abuses from public eye. This is supported by Hortensia, who says her parents simply didn't believe her about Trunchbull's abuses.

If that's the case, then the parents of Matilda's classmates are woefully underperforming as parents and aren't doing their due diligence. The alternative is that the parents are aware of Trunchbull's actions, and either don't care or actually endorse her actions. Considering there are torture devices in her office that she frequently throws children into, it'd be hard for any parent who actually visited the school to simply ignore Trunchbull's methods. It's a dark view on the parents in Matilda 's world (that also fits into the general tone of Roald Dahl's books like Matilda ).

From the delightful Matilda to the absurd shenanigans in Dumb and Dumber, here are ten ‘90s comfort movies to watch if you’re having a bad day.

3 Amanda Thripp Almost Died Right In Front Of Her Classmates

Amanda Thripp has one of the most memorable moments in Matilda , despite being a relatively minor character in the story. Amanda is one of the other children at Matilda's school, who is shown to be initially unafraid of Trunchbull. When she stands up for herself against her principal, Amanda finds herself grabbed by the pigtails and flung into the distance by the former Olympic shot putter . As the other students watch, Amanda heads to the edge of the school grounds and only barely clears the spiked fence. Luckily, she lands outside the fence and in a patch of flowers, which softens her landing.

However, if Trunchbull had put just a little less effort into the throw, then Amanda could have been impaled and even killed by the spike fence . Given Trunchbull's apparent ability to hide her crimes, she could have then said Amanda was hurt playing on the fences in an accident. Trunchbull would have also likely felt no guilt if that had been the result of her actions, given she's established elsewhere in the movie as a potential murderer. Amanda's scene was almost a traumatic moment for the entire school, and was only

2 Matilda's Powers Quietly Make Her Terrifying

Matilda's abilities in Matilda give her a crucial edge over Ms. Trunchbull and the other people in her life. However, it's worth how considering how frightening they would look from an outside perspective. Matilda's abilities give her a telekinetic power that she typically uses to simplify her life, but she's also adept at using it to torment characters like Trunchbull .

While this is somewhat justified by Trunchbull's aggressive and antagonistic attacks against Matilda and others, Matilda could have used her powers to attack other people as well. If she had developed those same abilities but had been truly influenced by her parents' to become cruel like her brother, Matilda could have become a genuine threat. There's also the chance that her powers could some day become too much for her to control , setting Matilda up for the kind of telekinetic outbursts seen in films like Carrie .

1 Matilda's Happy Ending Might Not Last Long

Matilda ends on a very sweet note, with Miss Honey formally adopting Matilda and giving her the kind of loving home any child deserves. However, there are enough lingering aspects of the ending that hint things might not work out in the long-run for Matilda . Her family flees the country to avoid the authorities, but their pronounced destination of Guam actually falls under US jurisdiction.

This means they'll likely be brought to justice, which could end up exposing how Matilda destroyed evidence to keep her parents ahead of the FBI. This could draw attention to Miss Honey's adoption of the young girl, which could be called into question and even potentially challenged. Matilda could find herself in a lot of trouble , even if her powers were able to remain a secret. If they come to light, she could get even more negative attention. This harsh reality that Matilda 's happy ending might not last forever adds a bittersweet element to the film's adorable conclusion.

Source: Radio Times

*Availability in US

Not available

Matilda is the 1996 live-action movie adaptation of Roald Dahl's 1988 novel of the same name. It tells the story of Matilda Wormwood (Mara Wilson), a child prodigy who develops telekinetic powers while dealing with her abusive family and her school's dictatorial principal Miss Trunchbull (Pam Ferris) with the help of her teacher Miss Honey (Embeth Davidtz). Danny DeVito directs the film and plays Matilda's father, Harry.

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Why do Matilda's parents treat her so badly?

Why do Matilda's parents act like they hate her? The movie shows them to be like this Dursleyish family, and it also has this general theme of adults hating children. They seem to like their older son just fine even though the father treats him a bit rough, but they seem to especially hate Matilda. Is it explained why? Is it because she's a girl?

My only reference is the movie, but if this is better explained in the book then a book answer is also appreciated.

• 3 Which movie? The 2022 musical (based on the stage play) or the 2016 live-action version ? –  Valorum Commented Mar 9, 2023 at 21:03
• 4 @Valorum I remember the one from 1980s being live action as well –  user13267 Commented Mar 10, 2023 at 0:19
• 9 @Valorum not sure why you said "2016 live-action version" because it is from 1996 –  Ivo Commented Mar 10, 2023 at 10:25
• 7 I'm pretty convinced that the Matilda book was JKRowling's main inspiration for the Dursleys, so it's a bit of a tautology to say that her family look "Dursleyish". –  Stef Commented Mar 10, 2023 at 11:39
• 3 @Stef you mean to tell me Vernon was Wormwoodish? –  user13267 Commented Mar 10, 2023 at 11:47

5 Answers 5

It's like this:

Matilda's parents are stupid, narrow minded dweebs. They are incapable of understanding a lot of things, and anything they don't understand they sneer at and look down on.

They don't understand Matilda. She reads books, her parents read only at gun point. She wants to learn, they want to be entertained. She wants good food, they want whatever is easiest to snarf down while watching TV. Her parents are willfully ignorant - and proud of it.

Her parents like her brother because he is the same as they are. They understand him, so they get along better with him.

That's it, really. Her parents' sights are set on getting the most out of the gutter they live in, while Matilda is busy looking over the curb and trying to reach all the beautiful things you can see if you just look up over the dirt.

I've never read the book. I've only seen the movie with Danny DeVito. I don't know if the book explains it at all.

• 14 That's what I remember from the book. –  Arno Commented Mar 9, 2023 at 17:05
• 1 Just read the book, and it's pretty much the same. –  TripeHound Commented Mar 10, 2023 at 17:46

Adults, especially parents, are often horrible in Roald Dahl's books. The parents in Charlie And The Chocolate family are all awful, though usually just by indulging their children too much, causing the children to become terrible people. The Twits don't have children but they're a horrible old couple. George's grandmother is a nasty old trout too. It's just part of Dahl's style. I think he does it to make children find him empathetic, since kids often have to deal with terrible adults in their lives.

It also gives the reader sympathy for Matilda, whose parents are particularly bad. If Matilda was just some gifted genius with telekinetic powers, you might not instantly like her, but if you feel sorry for her downtrodden existence, you root for her to win and get out of that life. Same way Miss Honey is dreadfully poor (margarine back in those days was pretty bad!).

It's all good storytelling, basically, and intended even for young children who don't necessarily get subtlety, just moving on from fairy tales that are very black and white.

• 2 In-universe explanations are generally preferred to out-of-universe ones. Can you explain why Matilda's parents treated her badly from an in-universe perspective? –  LogicDictates Commented Mar 10, 2023 at 1:06
• 17 I'm not writing fanfic about it, I'm telling you the real answer. They're books, they have an author, whose success depends on the quality of his ideas. Others have mentioned what evidence is available in the books, I'm just expanding on that as a theme, and it's a big one, in the author's other works. That's pretty common when discussing literature, though perhaps "scifi and fantasy" isn't the best place to discuss "Matilda", even if she does have psychic powers. –  Greenaum Commented Mar 10, 2023 at 1:41
• 6 @LogicDictates: When a question has a clear in-universe answer (either explicit, or clearly inferable) then that’s usually the ideal answer. But often, as here, the work doesn’t give a clear answer, and a lot of extrapolation is needed to find an in-universe explanation — and then out-of-universe considerations become important, to explain what kinds of extrapolation are appropriate for a given work. –  PLL Commented Mar 10, 2023 at 12:34
• @PLL - Providing an out-of-universe explanation is only important if that's what the OP was confused about. If the OP was aware of the out-of-universe explanation, but wanted to know if there was an in-universe rationale as well, then providing an out-of-universe explanation doesn't help them at all. –  LogicDictates Commented Mar 10, 2023 at 12:50
• I don't think most ordinary readers are as bothered about stuff as "canon" and "in-universe". They just want to discuss a book they enjoy, as a whole. The question of why Matilda's parents are so mean can be answered in different ways, and they're all relevant, all might be food for thought for all of us. A discussion doesn't need segmenting into tight categories, doing so often kills a decent conversation, while gaining... nothing. Categorising conversations and answers is way less important than actually having them. Writing about reading = good! –  Greenaum Commented Mar 15, 2023 at 11:50

There is no specific reason given in the book, but the following quote sums up Mr And Mrs Wormwood's attitude to their daughter:

They had a son called Michael and a daughter called Matilda, and the parents look upon Matilda in particular as nothing more than a scab. A scab is something you have to put up with until the time comes when you can pick it off and flick it away.

Taken from Matilda via Sparknotes .

It's not that they actively hate her specifically, just that she isn't top of their priority list. She is just a small person who happens to share their house, and they'd rather she wasn't there, but they tolerate her. If she wasn't "brilliant" and capable of taking care of herself from an early age (as evidenced in the movie with her ability to make pancakes), then she would have possibly suffered great neglect.

Often in Dahl's children's books, adults despise children but in this case, the parents are simply tolerating something they don't enjoy.

• The movie seems to show they love the son and hate the daughter. Is their relationship like that in the book too? –  user13267 Commented Mar 9, 2023 at 16:07
• 3 As per the wiki entry , Harry was trying to groom Michael as a successor to his car business. Michael largely also ignored Matilda, although he does wave goodbye to her as she leaves in the end. –  FuzzyBoots Commented Mar 9, 2023 at 16:43

From an out of universe perspective it was because she was an audience surrogate.

To a child the world can see harsh and arbitrary. Adults can seem overly prescriptive, and criticism can seemingly come out of nowhere for reasons that they don't understand.

Having authority figures who are inherently - and obviously - unreasonable invokes a sensation of kinship and an emotional attachment to the lead character in children who feel that they are punished simply for being children or for doing things that children do.

From an in universe perspective, it's because she is essentially honest and innocent. While her family are greedy and see honesty as a sign of weakness. Her father in particular spends his days scamming people (for example, filling car gearboxes with oil and sawdust to stop them from making a noise, or winding back a vehicle's mileage to make it seem newer).

He sees her book smarts as being a waste of time because they won't enable her to do what he does, but he also feels threatened by them, because he spends most of his time dealing with directing people away from problems (misdirection to conceal them) while she is both capable of seeing through his misdirection and putting forth actual solutions to the problems that he is seeking to hide.

He also begrudges the fact that she doesn't contribute to the household, she takes but never gives. At least not things that he sees as being useful.

More so, when she takes he is obliged to give because she is his daughter. He is perfectly OK taking from other people because he sees himself as smarter than they are and more deserving than they are. He tricks people into buying poor quality vehicles so he believes that he is owed what he gets from them, whereas he has to provide for Matilda because she's small and can't provide for herself. He sees this as being the equivalent of stealing from him.

Because it makes a good story. You're right to compare it to Harry Potter, because it's the same device. "How do I make my character instantly sympathetic?" You could have cited Oliver Twist or Horatio Hornblower or a thousand other scamps who overcame their upbringing to make good.

Yanking some heart-strings is a good way to get someone vested in your character. Would you have felt better about her if she'd had everything?

• 2 Indeed, Wikipedia says, “Many have drawn attention to the similarities between Rowling's works and those of Roald Dahl, particularly in the depiction of the Dursley family, which echoes the nightmarish guardians seen in many of Dahl's books, such as the Wormwoods from Matilda [....]” –  Davislor Commented Mar 10, 2023 at 21:01

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The 24 best kids' movies on Netflix in July 2024

The streamer's family-friendly library ranges from Oscar-winning films to beloved classics.

Netflix; Mary Evans/Ronald Grant/Everett; Netflix

When it comes to entertaining the whole family, Netflix has your back. The streamer's vast library has both animated and live-action films to delight every age. There are talking animals, of course — cats, crocodiles, baby dinosaurs, and elderly lizards — as well as fairy-tale heroes, dangerous robots, and two modern classics set in the Lego universe. 

Here's your guide to the best kids' movies on Netflix right now.

A Whisker Away (2020)

Lovestruck eighth-grader Miyo can't connect with her crush Hinode, until a mysterious mask seller gives her a Noh mask that allows her to transform into a little white cat. While Hinode rejects her as a human, he grows to love her as a pet, and she relishes the time they spend together. Things go sour when she confesses her love in a letter, causing her to lose her human face, which the playful mask vendor offers to a cat who wants to take her place. This sweet and suspenseful coming-of-age anime explores the challenges of expressing difficult feelings at an awkward stage of life.

Where to watch A Whisker Away : Netflix

Director: Junichi Sato, Tomotaka Shibayama

Cast: Cherami Leigh, Johnny Yong Bosch, Robert Buchholz, Keith Silverstein

Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio (2022)

Netflix / Courtesy Everett

It's got a cricket, a woodcarver, and a little wooden puppet that comes to life, but Guillermo del Toro 's stop-motion animated version of Pinocchio transforms the familiar tale into something entirely new. Set in Italy during Mussolini's fascist regime, the Oscar-winning film casts Pinocchio (Gregory Mann) as an inspiring spirit of civic disobedience. Ewan McGregor voices the cricket, tasked with guiding the impulsive boy through a series of adventures in the circus, the army, and the depths of the sea. It's a darker film than the Disney version, but it pulses with a deep appreciation for the miraculous gift of life.

Where to watch Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio : Netflix

Director: Guillermo del Toro, Mark Gustafson

Cast: Ewan McGregor, David Bradley, Gregory Mann, Christoph Waltz

Related content: Guillermo del Toro explains why his Pinocchio has so much fascism in it

The Lego Movie (2014)

Warner Bros. Pictures/courtesy Everett

Everything fits into place within the perfect plastic-brick world of The Lego Movie , and construction worker Emmet Brickowski ( Chris Pratt ) is happy to be one of the crowd — until a secret resistance movement identifies him as the prophesied leader they've been waiting for. A celebration of creativity and the toy brand's mash-up aesthetic, the movie sweeps Emmet into an epic battle with a tyrannical toy CEO, aided by a tech-savvy builder, a pink unicorn-cat, a wizard, and Batman. EW’s critic enthused , "It’s fast and original, it’s conceptually audacious, it’s visually astonishing, and it’s 10 times more clever and smart and funny than it needed to be."

Where to watch The Lego Movie : Netflix

EW grade: A ( read the review )

Director: Phil Lord , Chris Miller

Cast: Chris Pratt, Elizabeth Banks , Will Arnett, Will Ferrell

Related content: Chris Pratt covers "Everything Is Awesome" as Parks and Recreation's Andy Dwyer

Marcel the Shell With Shoes On (2022)

A viral sensation from the 2010s, Marcel the Shell ( Jenny Slate ) is a stop-motion animated fellow with a little voice and a huge heart, who putters around a big empty house and narrates his tiny life to an off-screen documentarian. After 10 years of YouTube fame, Marcel earned his own feature-length adventure, where he gets to leave the house and search for his lost family. Marcel's poignant relationship with his elderly grandmother (voiced by Isabella Rossellini ) and his earnest determination will make you forget that you're spending 90 minutes empathizing with a knickknack. 

Where to watch Marcel the Shell With Shoes On : Netflix

Director: Dean Fleischer Camp

Cast: Jenny Slate, Dean Fleischer Camp, Isabella Rossellini, Rosa Salazar , Thomas Mann

Related content: Marcel the Shell team on capturing the 'staccato brokenness' of a stop-motion world

Paddington (2014)

StudioCanal/Netflix

If the kids have never met Paddington , now is the time to introduce them. A talking teddy bear (voiced by Ben Whishaw ) arrives at a London train station searching for a new home after losing his family in the jungles of Peru. He's taken in by the warm-hearted Brown family, but a wicked museum taxidermist (played with malicious glee by Nicole Kidman ) plots to add him to her collection. EW’s critic praised the film , writing, "In honoring a beloved child-lit figure, writer-director Paul King has taken to heart the instructions hanging from Paddington's neck: 'Please look after this bear. Thank you.' Mission accomplished."

Where to watch Paddington : Netflix

EW grade: A- ( read the review )

Director: Paul King

Cast: Ben Whishaw, Hugh Bonneville , Sally Hawkins , Nicole Kidman, Jim Broadbent

Related content: Paddington credited with bump in sales of marmalade-making supplies

The Land Before Time (1988)

Universal/courtesy Everett

If your kids are in their dinosaur phase, they'll love this adventure film about an orphaned apatosaurus searching for a new home. When Littlefoot's mother dies and an earthquake separates him from the herd, he must use all his courage to travel to the Great Valley, where he'll find food and rest. Along the way, he links up with four other lost dino-children, each with their own quirks and personalities, whom he bonds with on their voyage through the unfriendly prehistoric environment. Clever character animation will make it difficult for you to choose your favorite of the five friends (probably Petrie).

Where to watch The Land Before Time : Netflix

Director: Don Bluth

Cast: Gabriel Damon, Candace Hutson, Judith Barsi, Will Ryan

Matilda the Musical (2022)

Dan Smith/Netflix

Matilda Wormwood (Alisha Weir) is smart, independent, and entirely unappreciated by her lowbrow parents who send her to Crunchem Hall, a boarding school designed to bring troublemakers into line. This spirited adaptation of the Roald Dahl book and West End musical features Emma Thompson as the tyrannical headmistress of the Hall and Lashana Lynch as a teacher who recognizes Matilda's special gifts. The film's high point is the show-stopping "Revolting Children" number, a rousing anthem about the powerless seizing their moment to shine. 

Where to watch Roald Dahl's Matilda the Musical : Netflix

Director: Matthew Warchus

Cast: Alisha Weir, Emma Thompson, Lashana Lynch, Stephen Graham

Related content: Nominated for Nothing: Matilda the Musical 's grade A take on a classic Roald Dahl story deserved more love

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023)

Sony Pictures Releasing/Marvel Entertainment/Courtesy Everett

Released last summer when everyone came down with a bad case of superhero fatigue, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse was the standout exception: a costumed crime-fighter movie that captured audiences' attention with its strong storyline, richly-defined character arcs, and knockout visuals. Miles Morales ( Shameik Moore ), a teenage Spider-Man, joins Spider-Woman Gwen Stacy ( Hailee Steinfeld ) on a journey into the multiverse, where he meets a dizzying array of alternate Spider-People and discovers that they're not all on the same side. EW’s critic writes that the movie "totally exceeds expectations when it comes to visual aesthetic and character development."

Where to watch Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse : Netflix

EW grade: B+ ( read the review )

Director: Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers, Justin K. Thompson

Cast: Shameik Moore, Hailee Steinfeld, Brian Tyree Henry , Jake Johnson

Related content: How Hobie Brown/Spider-Punk became the coolest character in Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

Shrek (2001)

DreamWorks/courtesy Everett

Once upon a time, when DreamWorks Animation was just an upstart competitor to Disney and Pixar, this fairy-tale satire surprised audiences with its cheeky subversion of the cartoon status quo. More than 20 years later, Shrek is still fresh and funny, with impeccable voice acting by Mike Myers as the furious green ogre; Eddie Murphy as his motor-mouth companion Donkey; Cameron Diaz as a not-so-helpless damsel in distress; and John Lithgow as a diminutive dictator. EW’s critic cheered , " Shrek lives happily ever after because it’s such a feisty but good-natured embrace of the inner ogre in everyone, and such an irreverent smackdown of the Establishment in all its 'heigh-ho' tyranny."

Where to watch Shrek : Netflix

Director: Andrew Adamson, Vicky Jenson

Cast: Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, Cameron Diaz, John Lithgow

Related content: Shrek 5 officially announced with Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, and Cameron Diaz returning

Nimona (2023)

In this science-fiction/fantasy epic, Nimona stars Chloë Grace Moretz as a rebellious young shapeshifter looking for a cause to fight for — preferably a messy, chaotic one. Hearing about a knight ( Riz Ahmed ) unfairly accused of killing the queen, Nimona appoints herself his new sidekick. Her ability to turn into any kind of animal — cycling between ostrich, squirrel, wolf, and whale, among others — gives her a special kind of freedom, even if other people consider her a monster. EW’s critic observed , "The story admiringly delves into how such monsters are in fact created by a society that refuses to accept their differences."

Where to watch Nimona : Netflix

Director: Nick Bruno, Troy Quane

Cast: Chloë Grace Moretz, Riz Ahmed, Eugene Lee Yang, Frances Conroy

Related content: The story of Nimona , the groundbreaking animated film that refused to die

The Sea Beast (2022)

Jacob Holland ( Karl Urban ) is tasked with hunting down the beasts in a kingdom threatened by enormous sea monsters. But when an orphan girl named Maisie (Zaris-Angel Hator) stows away on his voyage to kill the legendary Red Bluster, she helps Jacob discover that the creatures may be misunderstood. The Sea Beast was Netflix's most-watched original animated film, thanks to its exciting sea battles, the mismatched heroes' odd-couple chemistry, and the imaginatively rendered aquatic behemoths that range from cuddly to terrifying. 

Where to watch The Sea Beast : Netflix

Director: Chris Williams

Cast: Karl Urban, Zaris-Angel Hator, Jared Harris

The Lego Batman Movie (2017)

Warner Bros. /Courtesy Everett

A high-speed ride through the toy store of your dreams, The Lego Batman Movie constructs the ultimate kid-friendly blockbuster. When Batman ( Will Arnett ) refuses to acknowledge that the Joker ( Zach Galifianakis ) is his "greatest enemy," the deeply insulted clown prince of crime heads into the Phantom Zone to team up with the worst villains in the multiverse, including Voldemort, King Kong and the Wicked Witch of the West. EW’s critic predicted that "Seventy-five percent of the film’s carpet-­bomb campaign of pop culture meta punchlines will ricochet over the target audience’s head, but parents dragged along for the ride will no doubt be grateful for Arnett’s rat-a-tat send-ups of Adam West and superhero clichés."

Where to watch The Lego Batman Movie : Netflix

Director: Chris McKay

Cast: Will Arnett, Zach Galifianakis, Michael Cera , Rosario Dawson , Ralph Fiennes

Related content: Batman Rewatch: The LEGO Batman Movie and The Batman bury the Dark Knight to heap on praise

Vivo (2021)

2021 SPAI/Netflix

Hamilton 's Lin-Manuel Miranda composed the songs and voices the title character in Vivo . It’s the story of a singing kinkajou tasked with granting an old man's final wish: to deliver a romantic song to the man's lost love, all the way from Havana to Miami. Along the way, Vivo befriends an impulsive oddball, 10-year-old Gabi (Ynairaly Simo), whose passion for music far exceeds her actual talent. The pair travel by bike, bus, and boat to the journey's end, accompanied by Miranda's tunes. EW's critic observed that the movie "delivers as an energetic caper, moving from one colorful locale to another." 

Where to watch Vivo : Netflix

EW grade: B ( read the review )

Director: Kirk DeMicco, Brandon Jeffords

Cast: Lin-Manuel Miranda, Ynairaly Simo, Zoe Saldaña , Juan de Marcos, Gloria Estefan

Orion and the Dark (2024)

DreamWorks Animation/Netflix

People say you should face your fears, but what happens when they face you? One night, Orion ( Jacob Tremblay ), an overly anxious 11-year-old, is confronted with his worst nightmare when the spirit of Dark ( Paul Walter Hauser ) appears in his bedroom, introduces himself, and says he wants to be friends. Dark introduces him to the other night entities — Quiet, Sleep, Sweet Dreams, and Unexplained Noises — but Orion is more interested in the cocky, self-involved Light ( Ike Barinholtz ). Ultimately, it's up to an adult Orion's young daughter Hypatia (Mia Akemi Brown) to restore the balance of nature in this thoughtful, multi-generational fable. 

Where to watch Orion and the Dark : Netflix

Director: Sean Charmatz

Cast: Jacob Tremblay, Paul Walter Hauser, Colin Hanks , Ike Barinholtz, Mia Akemi Brown

Over the Moon (2020)

Chinese mythology meets space-age imagination in this musical fantasy, which sends 15-year-old Fei Fei in a homemade fireworks-powered rocket to the moon. Traveling with her white rabbit and an obnoxious stowaway step-brother, Fei Fei meets the pop star moon goddess Chang'e, who demands a gift that will bring back her lost love. Lunaria, the moon city, is a luscious riot of color and song, all neon energy and inspired visual flourishes. There's a high-stakes rap battle ping-pong competition, a touching moon-rabbit love story, and a gentle examination of loss and grief experienced by humans, mythological figures, and fantasy creatures alike. 

Where to watch Over the Moon : Netflix

Director: Glen Keane

Cast: Cathy Ang, Phillipa Soo , Ken Jeong , Robert G. Chiu

Related content: With Over the Moon , a Disney legend directs his first movie

Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget (2023)

Netflix /Courtesy Everett

Feathered fighters Rocky ( Zachary Levi ) and Ginger ( Thandiwe Newton ) escaped from Mrs. Tweedy's farm in 2000's claymation hit Chicken Run , but their carefree lives on a peaceful island sanctuary can't last forever. In this tasty sequel, a high-tech factory farm is built nearby, and Rocky and Ginger's headstrong daughter Molly ( Bella Ramsey ) is lured into the complex. Determined to retrieve her, the chickens and rats team up for a search-and-rescue mission in a witty spoof of Mission: Impossible and James Bond thrillers. Fans of the original film will find much to enjoy in this fast-paced second outing.

Where to watch Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget : Netflix

Director: Sam Fell

Cast: Thandiwe Newton, Zachary Levi, Bella Ramsey, Miranda Richardson

Related content: 'No one in the U.S. would understand it': Inside the making of Chicken Run

Courtesy of Netflix 

In this charming musical comedy, Leo features Adam Sandler as a 74-year-old reptile who realizes he's wasted his life sitting in a tank as a fifth-grade class pet. He dreams of escaping to the Everglades but only gets as far as the bedroom of whichever student takes him home for the weekend. On one trip, he accidentally reveals that he can talk, and ends up offering a girl advice on how to become more popular. Soon, every kid in class is confiding in Leo, as he shares the benefits of his many years observing young humans.

Where to watch Leo : Netflix

Director: Robert Marianetti, Robert Smigel , David Wachtenheim

Cast: Adam Sandler, Bill Burr , Cecily Strong , Jason Alexander

The Mitchells vs. the Machines (2021)

The Mitchells — Rick and Linda, with their daughter Katie and young son Aaron — take an impromptu cross-country road trip to bring Katie to film school. Rick and Katie have a hard time getting along, but when a disgruntled high-tech AI assistant programs an army of home robots to capture all humans, father and daughter must work together to shut the bots down and free humanity. A high-energy comedy adventure, The Mitchells vs. the Machines combines a well-observed portrayal of dysfunctional family dynamics with apocalyptic themes and biting satire about our tech-obsessed culture. 

Where to watch The Mitchells vs. the Machines : Netflix

Director: Mike Rianda, Jeff Rowe

Cast: Danny McBride , Abbi Jacobson , Maya Rudolph, Mike Rianda

Related content: Danny McBride takes on technology in The Mitchells vs. The Machines and real life

A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon (2019)

Netflix / courtesy Everett

In this treat from Aardman Animations, a flying saucer brings a new friend to Shaun the Sheep's tranquil farm: Lu-La, a lavender dog-alien with tentacles, levitation powers, and a ravenous sweet tooth. The creature turns out to be a child trying to find her way home, and she's being pursued by pleasantly bumbling agents from the Ministry of Alien Detection. The plot may be a familiar retread of E.T. and Close Encounters , but the story is presented in the charming Aardman house style, with their trademark visual ingenuity and clockwork comic timing. 

Where to watch A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon : Netflix

Director: Richard Phelan, Will Becher

Cast: Justin Fletcher, John Sparkes, Amalia Vitale, Kate Harbour

Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile (2022)

Sony Pictures Entertainment / Courtesy Everett

Josh's family has brought him to live in a New York City brownstone, and he struggles to adjust to his new home — until he discovers a friendly crocodile living in the attic. Lyle can't speak, but his singing is terrific thanks to Shawn Mendes , who voices the croc. Josh's parents soon grow accustomed to living with an enormous scaly beast, and things are further enlivened by the arrival of Lyle's former owner Hector ( Javier Bardem ), an eccentric showman who still hopes to hit the big time with the tuneful reptile. Meanwhile, their grumpy neighbor threatens to split up this lively found family.

Where to watch Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile : Netflix

Director: Will Speck, Josh Gordon

Cast: Javier Bardem, Constance Wu , Shawn Mendes, Winslow Fegley

Related content: Javier Bardem is singing and dancing with a reptile, and loving it

Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie (2017)

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Mischief-making fourth-graders George ( Kevin Hart ) and Harold ( Thomas Middleditch ) don't want to be split into separate classes, so they distract their disapproving principal ( Ed Helms ) by hypnotizing him into adopting the superhero identity of Captain Underpants. This ruse comes in handy when the school's malevolent science teacher, Professor Pee-Pee Diarrheastein Poopypants Esq., hatches a plot to eliminate all laughter from the school. EW's critic said that Captain Underpants works "because it never tries to be more or less than what it is: A breezily surreal story about two best friends who love pranks and tree houses and drawing superheroes who wear their Underoos on the outside."

Where to watch Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie : Netflix

Director: David Soren

Cast: Kevin Hart, Ed Helms, Thomas Middleditch, Nick Kroll

Related content: Kevin Hart creates wacky superhero in Captain Underpants movie trailer

Trolls (2016)

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A peppy pick-me-up for kids and grownups alike, Trolls features a sparkly, slap-happy community of Day-Glo forest dwellers who live for hugs, high-fives, and catchy dance numbers. Unfortunately, their latest celebration has attracted the attention of the gray-faced, goblin-like Bergens who can only experience happiness if they eat one of the Trolls. With the tribe facing extinction, the peppy Princess Poppy ( Anna Kendrick ) teams up with Branch ( Justin Timberlake ), the one gloomy Troll, to rescue their friends from Bergen Town. EW’s critic declared that "the movie’s serotonin pumps like a fire hose. It’s almost impossible not to surrender to the bliss."

Where to watch Trolls : Netflix

Director: Walt Dohrn, Mike Mitchell

Cast: Anna Kendrick, Justin Timberlake, Zooey Deschanel , Gwen Stefani , James Corden

Related content: Trolls: How Justin Timberlake, Miyazaki inspired the directors

The Angry Birds Movie (2016)

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Blasting out of the popular phone app, The Angry Birds Movie features Jason Sudeikis as the voice of Red, a bad-tempered bird who struggles to fit in with his placid island community. When a crew of pigs arrives determined to steal the colony's eggs, Red has to organize an avian resistance movement to combat the porcine threat. EW's critic promised that the movie "delivers a mildly diverting mix of winky meta-jokes and moral lessons, cannily aimed at both the next generation of tiny consumers and their more sophisticated parents."

Where to watch The Angry Birds Movie : Netflix

Director: Clay Kaytis , Fergal Reilly

Cast: Jason Sudeikis, Josh Gad , Danny McBride , Maya Rudolph

Related content: The Angry Birds Movie : Jason Sudeikis, Bill Hader exclaim angry words — exclusive

Yes Day (2021)

JOHN P. JOHNSON/NETFLIX

Realizing that they say "no" so often that their family never has any fun, parents Allison ( Jennifer Garner ) and Carlos ( Edgar Ramirez ) agree to a "yes day": 24 hours when they have to say yes to everything their three kids suggest. The challenge starts with a silly makeover for both parents, an enormous ice cream sundae, and a ride through the car wash with the windows down — but an anarchic trip to the amusement park ends with both parents arrested. Jenna Ortega steals the show as the eye-rolling eldest daughter in this cheerful, breezy comedy.

Where to watch Yes Day : Netflix

Director: Miguel Arteta

Cast: Jennifer Garner, Edgar Ramirez, Jenna Ortega, Julian Lerner

Related content: Jennifer Garner and Edgar Ramirez get wet and wild in Yes Day first look

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The Compelling Fan Theory That Connects Roald Dahl to Stephen King

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• Matilda and Carrie share similarities: both face abuse, wield telekinetic powers, and find solace in their teachers.
• A fan theory connects the two stories, suggesting Matilda grows up to be Carrie due to shared experiences.
• Despite differences in genres and authors, the theory is a fun and intriguing idea that adds a new layer to the iconic stories.

Roald Dahl and Stephen King . Two prolific authors who, aside from their tremendous success in literature, don't seem to have much in common. Roald Dahl's quirky imagination has crafted some of the most famous and beloved stories in children's literature, such as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Matilda, and James and the Giant Peach. Stephen King, however, is known as the Master of Horror and has been haunting our nightmares for decades with classics like Carrie, It, and The Shining.

And yet, despite their differences, there's an intriguing fan theory floating around the internet that connects two of these authors' most iconic works: Matilda and Carrie .

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Carrie (1976)

Stephen king finds success with carrie.

Unlike Roald Dahl and Matilda, Stephen King had not yet found success when he published Carrie. As the story goes, King was a struggling writer who, in his frustration, tossed his rough draft of Carrie into the garbage. His wife, Tabitha, fished it out of the trash, read the early manuscript, and convinced her husband to continue working on it. And from there, the rest is history.

Carrie's publication marked the start of Stephen King's long and flourishing career. The novel birthed four different adaptations . 1976's Carrie, starring Sissy Spacek as the titular character, has since become a horror movie classic. The other notable adaptation is 2013's Carrie, a modern reimagining of King's novel that starred Chloë Grace Moretz.

12 Stephen King Movies and Shows That Aren’t Based on His Books

Lauded as the “King of Horror” and an undisputed master of his craft, Stephen King has a sensational career spanning over fifty years.

Carrie follows a young female, who is the victim of parental abuse and discovers telekinetic powers. Poor Carrie White is bullied by her peers at school. Her home life isn't much better, where she's tormented by her religiously fanatical mother, Margaret. After being publicly humiliated at her prom, Carrie's telekinetic powers explode, unleashing hell upon everyone around her.

A Little Girl Named Matilda

Roald Dahl had already achieved success by the time he wrote Matilda in 1988. The story follows a precocious little girl named Matilda Wormwood, who's raised by a neglectful mother and father. Despite her parents' abuse, Matilda turns out to be wildly intelligent. She possesses a voracious appetite for books and consumes literary classics like Great Expectations and Jane Eyre before the age of five.

After pulling vengeful pranks on her parents, Matilda is sent off to elementary school, where she befriends her compassionate teacher, Miss Honey. She also clashes with the school's ruthless headmistress, Miss Trunchbull, who turns out to be Miss Honey's abusive aunt. As tensions escalate with Miss Trunchbull, Matilda discovers that she possesses more than a vast intellect.

She also has telekinetic powers. Wielding her telekinesis as a weapon, Matilda liberates her school, and Miss Honey, from Miss Trunchbull's tyrannical clutches. Matilda has been adapted twice for the big screen. Directed and produced by Danny DeVito, 1996's Matilda starred Mara Wilson as an American version of the titular character. Another film came in 2022, Matilda the Musical, which was based on the successful musical of the same name.

The Two Stories Share a Lot of Similarities

Matilda and Carrie share some striking similarities. Both stories follow a female character, who's the victim of parental abuse and neglect. Both girls are confronted by bullies -- Matilda by her headmistress and Carrie by her own peers. Both characters find solace in their teachers, who lend the girls comfort and support amid all the harshness they face.

More obviously, both Carrie and Matilda discover latent telekinetic powers. Both characters then weaponize these powers and use them for insidious reasons. Matilda uses them to create the illusion of ghosts, frighten the crap out of Miss Trunchbull, and run her out of town. And Carrie...well, Carrie uses her powers to pretty much murder everyone in sight on prom night.

The Fan Theory That Matilda Grows Up to be Carrie

Despite their similarities, these are two different stories by two different authors. So what's the fan theory that connects them? At the end of Roald Dahl's book, Matilda's family suddenly moves to Spain to avoid arrest, as her father has been selling stolen cars this whole time. Matilda opts to remain with Miss Honey, who happily adopts her. She's also bumped up to an older grade level to accommodate her intelligence.

At this point, Matilda no longer seems to have telekinesis. Miss Honey theorizes that it's because Matilda is now using her vast brainpower on a more challenging curriculum.

Now this is where the theory comes into play. Fans speculate that Miss Honey and Matilda eventually move to Chamberlain, Maine, which is the setting of King's novel. And for whatever reason, they change their names to Carrie and Margaret White.

Ian Fleming, Roald Dahl, and Sir Christopher Lee: The Spy Movie We Need

These three real life spies knew each other or had connections, meaning they met - and might have even had a wild adventure.

Over time, all the abuse that Miss Honey suffered at the hands of Miss Trunchbull begins to affect her mind. She becomes a deranged religious fanatic, who inflicts her own childhood trauma upon Matilda aka Carrie.

That precocious little girl then grows up to be a timid young woman. Carrie's psychic powers, which have been latent for years at this point , begin to resurface because of all the abuse. The high school prom prank becomes her tipping point and brings her powers back in full force. Carrie/Matilda wields her telekinesis like a weapon and takes revenge on everyone, including Margaret/the now demented Miss Honey.

Is there any truth to this fan theory? Absolutely not. But it's a fun idea that brings a compelling perspective to these iconic stories.

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Metacritic reviews

• 90 Variety Joe Leydon Variety Joe Leydon A delightfully twisted fairy tale that artfully juggles broad tomfoolery and sly drollery, along with a generous serving of sight gags enhanced by special effects. Even though it's being pitched primarily at younger moviegoers and their parents, pic is exuberantly quirky enough to please almost anyone.
• 88 Boston Globe Jay Carr Boston Globe Jay Carr Matilda is fresh and spirited, and while the edge on it keeps the film interesting, DeVito manages to tilt it expertly from darkness to light. [02 Aug 1996, p.E4]
• 78 Austin Chronicle Austin Chronicle The contrast of light and dark, good and evil, enlightenment and ignorance, innocence and corruption is the heart of this absurd, insightful, sincere, very funny fairy tale of a movie. The cast is uniformly superb.
• 75 Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert Matilda doesn't condescend to children, it doesn’t sentimentalize, and as a result it feels heartfelt and sincere. It's funny, too.
• 75 ReelViews James Berardinelli ReelViews James Berardinelli Hardly a moment of Matilda can be described as either juvenile or condescending, and, compared with many of this summer's so-called mature features, that makes for a delightfully refreshing change-of-pace.
• 75 Entertainment Weekly Ty Burr Entertainment Weekly Ty Burr Clearly, a lot of grown-up types are going to despise Matilda: gym teachers, school psychologists, used-car salesmen, critics who like their family fare immobilized by homiletic virtue. But kids will understand.
• 75 San Francisco Chronicle Edward Guthmann San Francisco Chronicle Edward Guthmann A zingy self-empowerment fantasy for kids.
• 75 San Francisco Examiner Barbara Shulgasser San Francisco Examiner Barbara Shulgasser DeVito directed this wonderful fantasy about a brilliant little girl with strange powers and a sunny disposition. Using special effects DeVito creates a visual delight that seems more British than American partly due to the origin of the material and partly due to the playfulness of DeVito and writers Nicholas Kazan and Robin Swicord.
• 70 The Telegraph The Telegraph Centered on Mara Wilson's extraordinary young girl Matilda, the kooky fantasy is comprised of charm, warmth and screwball comedy.
• 60 Empire Caroline Westbrook Empire Caroline Westbrook Matilda is a blackly comic, delightfully off-the-wall picture that both kids and adults will lap up.
• See all 21 reviews on Metacritic.com
• See all external reviews for Matilda

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The 10 Most Popular Movies on Netflix Right Now

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Ever since Netflix unveiled its “Top 10” feature, we have had a way to assess what people are watching on the streaming service. Each day, the “Top 10” feature shows the most popular films and TV shows as viewed by subscribers. But if you’re looking for a quick rundown of the Top 10 most popular movies on Netflix and a little more information on what they’re about and who’s in them, we’ve got you covered.

Netflix now shares what people watch worldwide and how many hours are spent each week on the streamer. Below, we've gathered the Top 10 most-watched films on Netflix this week and more information about each movie. Check out the current list below:

Editor's Note: Films with an asterisk (*) are unavailable to stream in the United States.

Top 10 Movies on Netflix Worldwide

We've broken down the Top 10 films on Netflix in the United States in the list below.

Read more about the best movies and shows on Netflix:

• The 50 Best Movies on Netflix Right Now
• The Best Shows on Netflix
• The Best Feel-Good Movies on Netflix Right Now

The 10 Most Popular Shows on Netflix Right Now

'Your Honor' is still one of the most-watched shows on Netflix.

10 'The Little Rascals' (1994)

Director: Penelope Spheeris | Runtime: 1 hour 22 minutes | Genre: Kids

Cast: Travis Tedford, Bug Hall, Brittany Ashton Holmes

Mischievous youngsters Spanky (Travis Tedford) and Buckwheat (Ross Elliot Bagley) lead an anti-girl organization, and they pick their buddy Alfalfa (Bug Hall) to represent them in an all-important soapbox car rally. When the boys then find their driver canoodling with schoolmate Darla (Brittany Ashton Holmes), they decide they must break up the couple. Unfortunately, while Spanky and his pals are busy meddling in Alfalfa's affairs, their prized race car is nabbed by two young toughs.

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9 'Jigsaw' (2017)

Director: Danny DeVito | Runtime: 1 hour 38 minutes | Genre: Kids

Cast: Mara Wilson, Danny DeVito, Rhea Perlman

This film adaptation of a Roald Dahl work tells the story of Matilda Wormwood (Mara Wilson), a gifted girl forced to put up with a crude, distant father (Danny DeVito) and mother (Rhea Perlman). Worse, Agatha Trunchbull (Pam Ferris), the evil principal at Matilda's school, is a terrifyingly strict bully. However, when Matilda realizes she has the power of telekinesis, she begins to defend her friends from Trunchbull's wrath and fight back against her unkind parents.

8 'Shrek' (2001)

Directors: Andrew Adamson, Vicky Jenson | Runtime: 1 hour 30 minutes | Genre: Animated, Comedy

Cast: Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, Cameron Diaz

On a mission to retrieve a princess from a fire-breathing dragon, gruff ogre Shrek teams up with an unlikely compatriot — a wisecracking donkey.

7 'The Super Mario Bros. Movie' (2024)

Directors: Aaron Horvath, Michael Jelenic | Runtime: 1 hour 32 minutes | Genre: Animated

Cast: Chris Pratt, Anya Taylor-Joy, Charlie Day, Jack Black

Magically teleported from Brooklyn to the Mushroom Kingdom, two plucky plumbers team up with a princess to battle a tyrannical fire-breathing turtle.

6 'Vanished into the Night' (2024)

Director: Renato De Maria | Runtime: 1 hour 32 minutes | Genre: Thriller

Cast: Riccardo Scamarcio, Annabelle Wallis, Massimiliano Gallo

Elena is an American psychiatrist who came to live in Italy, in Puglia, for the love of Pietro, a man with a stormy past. They got married, and had two children, with the dream of restoring a Masseria farmhouse and turning it into a hotel. But things didn't work out, and soon Pietro and Elena broke up. One night, their children vanish into thin air while they are with Pietro at the farm. He looks for them everywhere and in the end, in desperation, he is forced to warn Elena, with whom he is in a dispute over custody of the children. When Elena reaches him, she attacks him and blames him furiously. Until they receive a phone call: their children have been kidnapped, to get them back they will have to pay 150,000 euros in cash within 36 hours. For Elena it's all clear: the kidnappers are the loan sharks with whom Pietro got into debt to try in vain to restore the farm. They are dangerous people, capable of anything: Pietro and Elena will have to do as they say. Pietro is forced to turn to Nicola, an old criminal friend, who offers him a deal: he will give him the money he needs, but in exchange he wants him to leave that night for an island between Puglia and Greece, just three hours away, get some drugs from some of his business “partners” and bring them back. He always needs "clean" boats for his trade, and Pietro's is perfect for the purpose. Pietro agrees and embarks on a crazy adventure in the middle of the sea from which he miraculously emerges alive at dawn in the morning. But when he returns to Bari he finds a totally different situation from the one he had left just a few hours earlier: nothing seems to correspond to reality anymore, people behave absurdly, Elena first and foremost. Pietro thinks he is going crazy: what is happening? But he doesn’t have the time to think: time is running out and this crazy mystery must be solved quickly.

5 'The Long Game'

Director: Julio Quintana | Runtime: 1 hour 52 minutes | Genre: Drama

Cast: Jay Hernandez, Dennis Quaid, Cheech Marin

In 1955, five young Mexican-American caddies are determined to learn how to play and create their own golf course in the middle of the South Texas desert.

4 'Minions'

Directors: Pierre Coffin, Kyle Balda | Runtime: 1 hour 30 minutes | Genre: Animated, Comedy

Cast: Sandra Bullock, Jon Hamm, Michael Keaton

Evolving from single-celled yellow organisms at the dawn of time, Minions live to serve, but find themselves working for a continual series of unsuccessful masters, from T. Rex to Napoleon. Without a master to grovel for, the Minions fall into a deep depression. But one minion, Kevin, has a plan; accompanied by his pals Stuart and Bob, Kevin sets forth to find a new evil boss for his brethren to follow. Their search leads them to Scarlet Overkill, the world's first-ever super-villainess.

3 'A Family Affair' (2024)

Director: Richard LaGravenese | Runtime: 1 hour 53 minutes | Genre: Comedy

Cast : Nicole Kidman, Zac Efron, Joey King

The only thing worse than being the assistant to a high-maintenance movie star who doesn't take you seriously? Finding out he's smitten with your mom.

2 'Paw Patrol: The Movie' (2015)

Director: Keith Chapman | Runtime: 1 hour 29 minutes | Genre: Animated

Cast: Iain Armitage, Marsai Martin, Ron Pardo

No city's too big, no bark's too small! Ryder and the fearless pups head to Adventure City after greedy Mayor Humdinger takes over and starts trouble.

1 'Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F' (2024)

Director: Mark Molloy | Runtime: 1 hour 57 minutes | Genre: Action, Comedy

Cast: Eddie Murphy, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Taylour Paige

Detective Axel Foley (Eddie Murphy) is back on the beat in Beverly Hills. After his daughter’s life is threatened, she (Taylour Paige) and Foley team up with a new partner (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) and old pals Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold) and John Taggart (John Ashton) to turn up the heat and uncover a conspiracy.

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‘Bookworm’ Review: Elijah Wood and Nell Fisher Save the Adventure Genre in Ant Timpson’s Adorable Epic

Alison foreman.

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The good old-fashioned family adventure is a genre unto itself, and one worth celebrating when kid-friendly films as good as “Bookworm” open events like Fantasia Fest 2024 .

In this quietly epic tale of slow-won forgiveness and mutual understanding, the not-so-mystical Shawn Wise ( exquisite name) and his estranged 11-year-old, Mildred (Fisher), are forced to reconnect when a faulty toaster puts the girl’s mom (Morgana O’Reilly) in the hospital. The single Kiwi parent was doing her best to keep things afloat before the accident, but working three jobs and making the most of whatever passes for a magician’s alimony wasn’t enough for her and Mildred financially. Enter the Canterbury Panther, a local legend worth $50,000 to anyone who can deliver video proof of the stealthy cat supposedly stalking New Zealanders for food… and fun.

As the pair ventures into the wilderness in search of evidence, Strawn emerges not as Mildred’s chaperone but as her ill-fitting sidekick. Black nail polish and the utterly baffling decision to wear a leather jacket on a multi-day hike betray him as something of a well-meaning hack who, even with the best intentions, has no business taking a kid out camping. Sure, there’s that adage about not judging a book by its cover, but when forced onto the same situational shelf, Strawn and Mildred are about as complementary as a novelty spell book keychain and 26 volumes in an encyclopedic tome. An early misunderstanding about David Copperfield ( which David Copperfield, you might ask? Yikes!) draws attention to the duo’s vast divide as the reality of Strawn’s years-long absence gets harder to ignore. Those recognizable pain points set up a dynamic known all too well in kids’ films, asking: What do you do when your flake of a father finally shows up, but you’re the one still teaching him ?

Exposition in excess is demanded by the film ’s younger audience, who could get lost in the plot without Mildred condescendingly re-explaining events we’ve just seen unfold to her bewildered dad, always still piecing things together. But it’s a testament to the actors’ chemistry and Harvard’s writing that these chunkier moments seem more like snide refrains than a potentially annoying narrative framework. Battling the vastness of being outside, Fisher more than keeps up with the elastic Wood in her explosive physicality — brightly skipping through breathtaking scenes like just another native animal captured through cinematographer Daniel Katz’s keen lens.

Tying all that together is Wood, who, even stuck in the poster’s background, remains an undeniable movie star. There’s one scene set at twilight (it’s breathtaking, maybe Katz’s best, and oddly evocative of “Dune”?) that sees Strawn exhausted by his current circumstance but still caught up with the shameful skeletons in his self-obsessed closet. Wood works through the tender and funny fireside monologue with a deadpan seriousness wholly committed to through Fisher’s sparkling eyes and sound design that seems to emanate from beyond the horizon. In that moment, everything that makes “Bookworm” a piece of earnestly great, and maybe even timeless, filmmaking snaps into focus.

Fearlessly specific in its comedy and just as attentive with its character arcs, this algebraic study in adventure might have a metaphoric typo or two (insert obligatory comment about CGI), but it’s mostly a triumph. Adorable, complex, and deliriously entertaining, Timpson’s second feature is nothing short of a testament to giving yourself artistic whiplash with polar-opposite projects that need many of the same skills. With the knowledge that their connection as father and daughter hasn’t meant much before now, Mildred and Strawn’s story is ultimately about getting to know each other as people. As a sophomore effort, “Bookworm” serves a similar purpose — letting Timpson fans know him more completely as a textbook genre champion and masterful cinematic appreciator of deadbeat dads.

“Bookworm” premiered at 2024 Fantasia Festival . The film releases in its native New Zealand on August 8 from Rialto Distribution. It will be distributed by Vertical in the U.S. and by Photon Films in Canada later this year.

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What is 'Hillbilly Elegy'? Everything to know about VP candidate JD Vance's book

Former President Donald Trump selected Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance on Monday to be his 2024 vice-presidential running mate.

Vance, who grew up in Jackson, Kentucky, and Middletown, Ohio, skyrocketed to fame as the author of “Hillbilly Elegy.” The book later turned into a movie of the same name that was released in 2020.

Here's what to know about "Hillbilly Elegy."

Is JD Vance's 'Hillbilly Elegy' based on a true story? What is it about?

Yes. Vance described a childhood consumed by poverty and abuse in "Hillbilly Elegy," his  best-selling 2016 memoir . Vance's mother struggled with drug addiction, so he spent many of his formative years with his grandmother – known to him as Mamaw. The book, which has 4.3/5 stars out of over 96,000 ratings on Amazon, also touches on his journey to a Yale Law School degree that opened doors for him in Silicon Valley.

"Hillbilly Elegy" later turned into a  Netflix feature film of the same name.

What to know about 'Hillbilly Elegy,' the movie

The movie inspired by Vance's book released to Netflix in 2020. Directed by Ron Howard, it stars Amy Adams and Glenn Close. Vance's character is played by Gabriel Basso. Owen Asztalos also plays the younger version of him.

The IMDB description says, "An urgent phone call pulls a Yale Law student back to his Ohio hometown , where he reflects on three generations of family history and his own future."

The film, which is rated R, received a 6.7/10 on IMDB and 25% on Rotten Tomatoes .

Where was 'Hillbilly Elegy' filmed?

According to Decider , "Hillbilly Elegy" was partially filmed in Vance's hometown of Middletown, Ohio, as well as Atlanta and Clayton, Georgia.

Who is JD Vance's mother?

Vance's parents are Donald Bowman and Bev Vance. The two divorced when he was a toddler, according to Politico . In the movie, Bev Vance's character is played by Amy Adams.

Where can I watch 'Hillbilly Elegy'

The film is available to stream on Netflix.

Where is Middletown, Ohio?

Middletown is located in Ohio's Butler and Warren counties, the southwest portion of the state. It's part of the Greater Cincinnati area.

Who is JD Vance? Vice presidential candidate has multiple ties to Columbus

'Hillbilly Elegy' trailer