Cheap Matilda (Special Edition) (1996)

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Matilda is worth watching, and I think worth owning too. However, let's get the reservations over before all the good stuff.

Miss Trunchbull, played by Pam Ferris, is a sadist. She is definitely mean. At two places in the movie she throws a child out a school window (she is really, really mean). Matilda's parents are self-absorbed and at best ignore Matilda, which occasionally borders on abuse. The images of Matilda's school can be disturbing, especially the "Chokie", a small cramped dark closet with spikes in the door. These images could be disturbing for younger children, particularly those under the age of 7 or 8. However, you have to judge the ability of your child to understand that these images are not real. These are the dark parts of the movie.

Matilda is clearly a genius, as evidenced by her actions from a very early age. Matilda overcomes her not very bright parents and learns how to fend for herself in the world. In fact, after a while she treats her parents as something to be concerned about, because they clearly do not know how to take care of themselves in the world.

Matilda is a positive role model throughout the movie. She learns to read on her own, and finds the value in the library and books. She learns that there are people who understand her (Miss Jennifer Honey, played by Embeth Davidtz) and love her for who she is. She also learns that people who seem scary to her (Miss Trunchbull) can be scary to others. Her desire to protect others and do what is right helps her overcome her fear of Miss Trunchbull and do what is right.

Mara Wilson plays Matilda very well. She has a lot of talent, and makes Matilda come alive. Danny De Vito plays Matilda's father and Rhea Perlman plays Matilda's mother, and every time I see them I cringe because these two are very unlikable characters, and I like Danny particularly. Danny also does a very good job narrating this movie, which somewhat ameliorates his turn as a semi-villain.

This movie celebrates, as it does in most Roald Dahl books, the triumph of right over wrong, and perhaps good over evil. The characters verge on being cartoonish, which is fitting for a children's movie. Having Matilda be telekinetic adds a wonderful element of fantasy with which children will identify. It is often a childhood fantasy to have powers or abilities to make things right, and Matilda obtains such a power and uses it for good.

This movie has a darker side, but the humorous moments and the Matilda's triumph over all the odds against her make this a fun movie. Worth watching again and again, I think this movie is well targeted to 8 to 12 year olds, but those of us adults that want to still believe that good will always triumph over bad and that good things eventually come to good people will find the message uplifting.

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WHY, oh, WHY wasn't this made into a widescreen special edition? Some of the special features are even in widescreen. What in the world is up with that?? I enjoyed the special features, but wish there had been more (like a commentary). I don't get why they wasted time in making this without using the widescreen format. I feel like I've been taken.

About the movie: this is a favorite in our family. It's a bit dark, and some people are upset by it, but there's a positive message and a happy ending (oops, was that a spoiler?) I highly recommend it, and probably the best age to see this would be 6 or 7 and up, depending on how sensitive your child is.

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Every now and then I see a movie intended for younger viewers that impresses me. Matilda, based on the book by Roald Dahl (Witches, James and The Giant Peach, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory) is one such movie. This is the story of a young girl who is special. She is very intelligent, self-sufficient, and inquisitive.

When Matilda's parents (Danny DeVito and Rhea Perlman) realize that she is old enough for school (sort of late) they send her to a private school run by a horribly mean woman who hates children. This environment, coupled with her life at home with a family that barely knows she is there, causes Matilda to discover and develop telekinetic powers. These she uses to help a friendly teacher and the rest of the students.

Once again a Roald Dahl book has been made into a very good movie. DeVito is excellent as a crooked used car salesman and Perlman is great as his wife. Matilda is played by the same actress who was in the remake of Miracle on 34th Street. The imagery and story are of the type that can only be found in stories for younger audiences. Although the movie does differ from the book this is a movie that I highly recommend.

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Other reviewers are correct. MATILDA, one of Danny DeVito's underrated masterpieces of humor, was released in 2.35:1. Once again, a DVD release crops it to fit "conventional" televisions. The term "conventional" is fast become outdated, since 16:9 widescreen digital TVs are getting increasingly affordable. My humble suggestion: make clear to studios that charging us full price for only half the frame of the director's movie are charging TOO MUCH. Wait for a "real" special edition that presents the film as DeVito intended it to be seen.

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Mathilda Wormwood (Mara Wilson) is an extremely curious and intelligent young girl who is very different from her low-brow, mainstream parents (Danny DeVito and real-life wife Rhea Perlman), who quite cruelly ignore her. As she grows older, she begins to discover that she has telekinetic powers. Not until a teacher shows her kindness for the first time does she realize that she can use those powers to do something about her sufferings and help her friends as well. Villains from the awful Miss Trunchbull (Pam Ferris), headmistress of her miserable school Crunchem Hall, to her parents and older brother begin to feel her ire. Look for Paul Reubens (aka Pee Wee Herman) in a small part as an FBI agent investigating Mathilda's shady father.

The mordant vision of author Roald Dahl's world probably appealed to the director of War of the Roses and Hoffa, for it permeates this witty, eccentric, dark-toned children's film for adults. Matilda (Mara Wilson), an unusually bright 8-year-old whose reading fare runs to Moby Dick and For Whom the Bell Tolls, is saddled with a pair of comically selfish and obtuse parents (Danny De Vito and Rhea Perlman) whom she has to persuade to allow her to go to school. But her principil, the child-hating Miss Trunchbull Pam Ferris, proves no more enlightened than her parents. This hilariously exaggerated, Lewis Carroll-like version of the world is probably not too far from what many children may feel on a bad day. De Vito and Perlman camp it up outrageously and Ferris gives a terrific performance as a cartoonish villain. Cinematographer Stefan Czapsky shoots from a number of strange angles, making this perhaps the first expressionist film for children.

This DVD of course has just the awful fullscreen version and, there is so much picture information missing from the sides. This was shot in the ratio of 2:35 so, we are not seeing all that we should be.

Thankfully I have the laserdisc widescreen version which I just recently put to DVD-R and so now I can enjoy MATILDA'S beautiful picture quality and in its widescreen beautiful glory!!

By the way, the extras on this special edition DVD is great, especially the piece that Mara shot on the set of the movie. She uses a vidcam and,its just so adorable. This is the best part of all the extras in my opinion.

So, even tho the DVD is in fullscreen, which really stinks, the extras are a treat and, oh yes, on some of the extras they show the widescreen version and, this is nuts because if they used the widescreen to show samples of how they did the special effects and other things, then WHY did they not use the widescreen version for the DVD??