Matilda (film)/Heartwarming

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • The end of the film version of Matilda features this scene at the end when Matilda's family is forced to leave the country.:

Matilda: I love it here! I love my school; it isn't fair! Miss Honey, please don't let them...
Harry Wormwood: [interrupting] Get in the car, Melinda!
Matilda: Matilda!
Harry Wormwood: Whatever.
Matilda: I want to stay with Miss Honey.
Zimmia Wormwood: Miss Honey doesn't want you. Why would she want some snotty, disobedient kid?
Miss Honey: Because she's a spectacularly wonderful child and I love her!

  • Doubles as a Crowning Moment of Funny, but:

Matilda: Here, I've got the adoption papers right here!
Zinnia Wormwood: How long've you had these?
Matilda: [Gives her a triumphant look] Since I was old enough to xerox.

    • Just the thought that she had copied the forms when she was three or four, that she had wanted to get out of that family that long and finally had... Warm. Fuzzy.
  • And the immediately following line from Zinnia: "You're the only daughter I've ever had, Matilda, and I never understood you, not one little bit... Who's got a pen?" It's this woman finally doing something good for her daughter, and this troper also thought she was expressing regret for what went wrong with their family.
  • Go on, watch the "Little Bitty Pretty One" scene without smiling. I dare you.
  • The narration about Matilda's relationships with her books, which described the authors as being a way to let her know, "You are not alone." As a child who loved books and felt alienated a lot, it really hit home for this troper.
  • The montage at the end of Miss Honey and Matilda having fun now that The Trunchbull is run out of school and Matilda's parents have fled the country. It's unbelievably sweet.

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