Matilda (1996) is one of the best family films ever made. It's witty, beautifully acted, well shot, and equal parts dark and hopeful, enough to appeal to older audiences as well as kids.

Matilda is such a great movie. I won't say it's underrated, because it does have a 90% on RT, but man, rewatching it with the family this Christmas for the first time since I was a kid has really floored me.

As I said in the title, it's got some genuinely clever dialogue ("She can work out large sums, in her head!" insists Ms Honey, to which the evil headmistress Ms Trunchbull cynically replies "So can a calculator." And so many more) There are some great visual gags (that ridiculous oil painting of the headmistress as an Olympian hanging above her own fireplace).

It's also filled with great minor characters who play their parts so well (bloody Bruce Bogtrotter and his god damn chocolate cake - that scene was perfect).

Most of all, in my opinion, it excels because it doesn't shy away from the over-the-top, black and white good vs evil world Roald Dahl books tend to create. In fact, it embraces this and turns it into a strength. Ms Trunchbull is so ridiculously and irredeemably evil (in one shot we see that she's throwing darts at what we would assume is a dartboard off screen, and then shortly after we see that she is indeed using a dartboard, but it's covered in headshots of students. It's absurd but so perfect and another great visual gag). The sets back it up and compliment this perfectly, with the school being almost comically dreary and dark, like it has jumped right out of the children's book, and the tacky Wormwood household reflecting her awful parents really well. And maybe my favorite set - the Trunchbull house (formerly Ms Honey's) which is obviously beautiful once but has fallen into complete disrepair with vines and layers of dust and junk everywhere) And then Ms Honey is so sweet that it makes her juxtaposition with Trunchbull (and living under her oppressive thumb) so sad to see.

Which brings me to the quite dark undertones of the film - the story about how Ms Honey was raised by Ms Trunchbull is presented in quite a piecemeal and subtle way, with heavy implication that Trunchbull killed Honey's father to inherit his estate, and culminates in a pretty creepy (yet satisfying) psuedo haunting to run Trunchbull out of town. There's also that horrific sequence where Matilda has snuck into Trunchbull's house and is desperately trying to find a way out without being found. It's so tense I was surprised how effectively it had been directed and edited.

And yet the film has a really hopeful tone even in the darkest parts, obviously culminating in the ending which is beautiful (and a bit silly but like I said before, the silliness is embraced every step of the way).

The only thing I wasn't too hot on was the magic element - only because it feels like the story really doesn't need it and every time it came up it was like 'oh, that's right, she has magic powers.'

So yes. I could go on and on, but I love this film for all the above reasons. It is the perfect Dahl adaptation because it embraces its own absurdity, and has the balls to by quite dark in both plotting and humour while still being suitable for kids.

What do you think of this film?

Submitted December 25, 2018 at 10:56PM by inhumancode http://bit.ly/2ELyF0y