Matilda Trivias

A cameo appearance in Matilda, Jon Lovitz is shown as the host of the fictitious game show, Million Dollar Sticky.

The fact that Matilda tells Ms. Honey at the end of the movie (a mouse's heart beats so fast that it sounds like it's humming) is a reference to another of Roald Dahl's books, The Witches.

This film was spoofed in I Am Weasel, episode "Leave it to Weasel".

The picture of Miss Honey's father, Magnus, is actually a portrait of Roald Dahl, the author of the book upon which the film is based.

Miss Honey tells Matilda that as a child Miss Honey had a doll named Liccy Doll. One of the producers of the film is author Roald Dahl's widow, Liccy Dahl.

One of the lunchboxes reads, "Greeting from Asbury Park, New Jersey", a reference to Danny DeVito's hometown. "Greetings from Asbury Park, New Jersey" is also the name of Bruce Springsteen's first album, and the name of the late professional wrestler Bam Bam Bigelow's finisher.

In both the book and film Matilda reveals her fondness for Charles Dickens. However, in the film, when revealing this to Miss Honey, she accidentally refers to him as "Dahl's Chickens"- an obvious nod to the Big Friendly Giant's mispronunciation of the same author in The BFG.

Rachel Snow appears as an extra in this film. She can be seen briefly in some scenes.

At one point in the movie, Matilda's brother can be seen wearing a Napalm Death, then later a Judas Preist T-shirt.

When Matilda is running through the closet a mop falls on her and on the bottom of the screen, you can see a camera shadow.

The car Agatha Trunchbull bought from Harry Wormwood is a 1970 Buick Electra 225 hardtop sedan.

Pam Ferris would often stay in character when the director called cut in an attempt to actually scare the children on set so that their fear would be genuine when the camera was rolling.

When her father pulls her up by the ear, it is shown from the back so as not to scare people.

Chalk "X" on the blackboard changes to a straight line.The FBI agent's camcorder opens twice.Magnus' picture faces into the room at first then later faces toward the window when Matilda gets the doll.

When Matilda first arrives at school, she has a sweater on over her dress, and a school journal in her hand. In the next shot, when Ms. Trunchbull comes out, the sweater and the journal are gone. Later when Matilda is inside the classroom, the sweater is still gone, but the journal reappears. Then when she gets home from school the sweater is back on.When Lavender is levitated, the wires are visible as she descends (pan and scan version).The icing on Matilda's cake at "The Ritz" jumps about between shots.

The position of the lid on the chocolate box changes between shots (after it is replaced in a hurry as Trunchbull enters the house).We see the chandelier in the foyer of Miss Honey's house fall to the floor in one shot while Miss Trunchbull is chasing our two heroes, but minutes later it's hung up again.The Trunchbull's cake has two layers in some shots and three layers in others.

The water level in the glass that holds the newt.When Matilda levitates the water pitcher to show Miss Honey her powers, the shadow of the water pitcher is still where it should be if it were sitting on the tabletop.Before the spoon goes in Matilda's mouth, a rod is seen sticking out of the one end, clearly holding it up. (full frame only)

When Matilda arrives at school for the first time, the principal is coming out of the door. The shadow of the kids walking back emphasizes their fear. In the next shot the feet of the principal and some kids are shown: the ground is fully shadowed though.After cutting Harry's hat off, Zinna sits down to watch TV and puts her sunglasses on twice.When Matilda is levitating the doll out of the window she is sitting on the roof and the shingles are obviously made of some type of soft material because they give way when she is moving about them.

When Matilda grabs the floating tape from the cop's open recorder, the sound of her hand touching the tape and the action of her actually grasping it do not match.When Zinnia is trying to cut the hat off of Harry's head, she walks around to cut the hat from behind Harry and places her hand on it, which makes the hat move while it is "still glued on".When Ms. Trunchbull puts Matilda in the chokie she bumps into one of the nails sticking through the door and it shakes like it's rubber.

When Harry is gluing the bumper back on the car, in the first shot he smears the glue on. But in the next the glue is perfectly even.When Zinna is coloring her hair, you can see that there's no hair dye in the bottle.When Amanda is thrown over the fence, she slides along the ground then stands up and shakes herself but the sound comes seconds later.

At the beginning of the scene when Harry comes home and asks Michael to get a pen and paper to take down his profits for the day, before they get to the table there is a full shot of the table and no one is sitting at it. A different angle shows Matilda is sitting at the end of the table which was empty a second earlier.When Harry, Matilda and Mikey go to the car shop where Harry works, Harry tells Mikey that the car which he bought for $100 has 120000 miles on the clock. But when he connected the drill to the mileage cable the mileage on the clock doesn't show 120000 miles.While Matilda cooks the pancakes, they look burnt. As they land on the plates (after being cooked), they look fine and light-coloured.

When we first see baby Matilda she has brown eyes. But when Mara Wilson takes over she has gray eyes.The position of Miss Honey's hair when she enters Ms. Trunchbull's office, suggesting that Matilda takes older or advanced classes.When the black cat is chasing Miss Trunchball you can hear a meowing sound, but the cat isn't opening its mouth.

The picture of Miss Honey's father, Magnus, is actually a portrait of Roald Dahl, the author of the book "Matilda," upon which the film is based.As a child, Miss Honey had a doll named Liccy Doll. One of the producers of the film is author Roald Dahl's widow, Liccy Dahl.

One of the lunchboxes reads, "Greeting from Asbury Park, New Jersey", a reference to Danny DeVito's hometown. "Greetings from Asbury Park, New Jersey" is also the name of Bruce Springsteen's first album.At one point in the movie, Matilda's brother can be seen wearing a Napalm Death T-shirt.

Pam Ferris would often stay in character when the director called cut in an attempt to actually scare the children on set so that their fear would be genuine when the camera was rolling.Richard Donner was considered to direct the film.Harry and Zinnia Wormwood are married in real life.