The mean-spirited children’s books of Roald Dahl have, rather oddly, become indelible classics. That’s probably because Dahl — a former British espionage agent, and writer of even grimmer short stories for adults — was under no illusion that childhood was a wonderful time.
Books like “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” “Matilda” and “The Witches” confirm what most children already suspected: that adults have a general disdain for kids, and that if kids were going to survive, they’d have to save themselves. At their best, adaptations of Dahl’s work capture that cynical spirit. At their worst, they fall prey to Dahl’s basest instincts, an unfortunate tendency towards bigoted portrayals and unhealthy themes.
When exploring every Roald Dahl movie, however, you can’t stop at the kids’ films. Dahl was also a screenwriter who adapted the works of other authors to the big screen, and not every filmmaker was interested in his tales of childhood fantasy. His thrillers had some motion-picture appeal too. (Note: Made-for-TV movies were excluded from the list, and due to availability issues, the Iranian film “The Silent Hunt” couldn’t be included either.)
Honorable Mention: “Four Rooms” (1995)
The whimsical anthology film stars Tim Roth as a hapless bellboy who, on a particularly eventful New Year’s Eve, finds himself alone in the hotel with four very needy groups of guests. An anthology film from directors Allison Anders, Alexandre Rockwell, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino, “Four Rooms” is — like many anthology films — a little inconsistent, with Rodriguez’s screwball installment standing out as the funniest and most effective. But Tarantino’s concluding tale, an adaptation of Roald Dahl’s grim short story “Man from the South.” is a satisfying capper, finding Roth dragged into an ill-conceived wager involving an everyday lighter and a meat cleaver. The writing is smart, the ending is a hoot, and if Dahl’s work comprised more than a mere 1/4 of the movie, it would have made the official list. And it would have ranked highly.
13. “The Witches” (2020)
Robert Zemeckis’s remake of “The Witches” moves the story to mid-20th century Alabama, and wisely casts Octavia Spencer as the heroic grandmother, Anne Hathaway as the vampy Grand High Witch and Stanley Tucci as the snooty hotel clerk. The good ideas end there. Despite some entertaining performances, the changes to the plot fall flat and the film’s conclusion can’t help but come across as even more uncomfortably sexist than the story — which already vilifies older, childless, conventionally unattractive women — usually does.
12. “You Only Live Twice” (1967)
James Bond creator Ian Fleming was an associate of Dahl during World War II, when they both worked as espionage agents. Although their literary careers went, mostly, in very different directions, Dahl nevertheless adapted one of Fleming’s 007 stories to the silver screen, writing the script for “You Only Live Twice.” The film boasts outstanding production design, especially Blofeld’s iconic volcanic doom lair, and exciting set pieces, like the equally iconic pool of piranhas. It is also rather staggeringly racist, with an extremely cringe-inducing plot point where James Bond is put in yellowface in order to save the day. It’s in such genuinely bad taste that, no matter how impressive other elements might be, “You Only Live Twice” can be very difficult to watch.
11. “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” (2005)
When Tim Burton decided to remake “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,” we all knew that Johnny Depp would take over the role of quirky chocolatier Willy Wonka and make it quirkier than ever. But his decision to base the character around the real-life persona of Michael Jackson was unsettling at the time, and it hasn’t, in the intervening years, aged any better. Bizarre new context aside, Burton’s vision for the Wonka factory is unexpectedly uninviting, his characters not just morally dubious but actively shrill, and the tacked-on third act effectively misses the point. There are, it must be said, some nifty set pieces and a fabulous performance from Deep Roy as every single Oompa Loompa.
10. “36 Hours” (1965)
Adapted from a short story called “Beware of the Dog,” George Seaton’s high-concept spy thriller stars James Garner as a U.S. Army Major who gets kidnapped by the Nazis in World War II and tricked into thinking he’s awoken from a coma after America won the war. It’s a needlessly elaborate scheme, and the historical setting makes the ending a bit of a foregone conclusion, but Rod Taylor makes a surprisingly fascinating villain, and Eva Marie Saint brings genuine pathos to her character, a complicated pawn in this wicked game. “36 Hours” presages superior takes on similar material, like the classic TV series “The Prisoner,” and it probably would have worked better as an episode of an anthology show, where the twists could have more impact.
9. “James and the Giant Peach” (1996)
Henry Selick’s adaptation of Dahl’s beloved children’s book unfortunately highlights just how little substance there was to its source material. The film stars Paul Terry as James, a little boy raised by despicable aunts after his parents — in a plot point that could only have have inspired extensive research into the subject of rhinoceroses — were eaten by a rhino. Fortunately for James, he finds his way into a gigantic peach filled with anthropomorphic, gigantic insects, each of whom is completely lovely and has things to teach him. They go on an epic journey, and Selick directs the living heck out of all the stop-motion animated wonders, but the story is impossibly thin, and the songs make no impression. It’s a sweet film, not a great one.
8. “The BFG” (2016)
There’s only one scene in Steven Spielberg’s filmography where a giant expels magic floating farts with the Queen of England, and it’s in this movie. “The BFG” is an odd entry in Spielberg’s resumé, given to piques of his trademark wonder but also sometimes bafflingly silly and immature. The film’s humor is hit-and-miss, but its insistence that dreams can be bottled is a little wondrous, and Mark Rylance gives a sweet motion-captured performance as the “big friendly giant” of the title.
7. “The Night Digger” (1971)
Patricia Neal, who was married to Dahl at the time, stars in this twisted psychological thriller as a woman stifled by her rich, elderly adopted mother, who becomes romantically fascinated with their new gardener. He’s a handsome younger man, played by Nicholas Clay, and he’s harboring a big secret — he’s a serial killer — but it’s not nearly as much of a dealbreaker as you might think. Dahl wrote the screenplay, adapting Joy Cowley’s novel “Nest in a Fallen Tree,” and it’s a twisted little work with unexpected sensitivity and humor. But it struggles to justify a feature-length running time, and Clay can’t keep up with the subtle performances of his co-stars.
6. “Matilda” (1996)
Danny DeVito’s adaptation of one of Dahl’s best children’s books has a great lead in young Mara Wilson, and it’s a largely faithful adaptation of the story despite moving it to America, where the story’s distinct vision of an oppressive British school system doesn’t quite fit. DeVito also seems eager to shy away from the darkest parts of the story — about a little girl whose preternatural brilliance is ignored by uncaring, selfish adults, and eventually breaks out in psychic phenomena — but makes an exception where the memorably monstrous Trunchbull (Pam Harris) is concerned. A few tonal and contextual disconnects aside, DeVito’s “Matilda” is a satisfying and empowering adaptation, and solid entertainment for children.
5. “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” (1968)
Seemingly unsatisfied with adapting Ian Fleming’s James Bond to the silver screen, Roald Dahl also adapted Fleming’s children’s story about a flying car just one year later. The very, very strange film that came out of it stars Dick Van Dyke as a childlike inventor and widower, who woos the lovely daughter of a local candy tycoon and eventually takes his flying car to a faraway land filled with comically homicidal royals and the despicable child-catcher, who (true to form) catches children. The story is flimsy and seemingly gets lost halfway through, transforming Ken Hughes’ “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” into another film altogether. But it’s all wonderfully imaginative, with catchy songs and unforgettable sights.
4. “Roald Dahl’s Matilda The Musical” (2022)
The second adaptation of Roald Dahl’s “Matilda,” this time by way of the award-winning Broadway/West End musical, is an absolute charmer. The story is streamlined, removing unnecessary characters and playing up small elements of the book in unexpectedly big ways, but the soul of the work is very much intact, and the songs are energetic, infectious, and to a one, rather fabulous. Alisha Weir is fantastically multifaceted in the title role, and Emma Thompson is wonderfully wicked as the Trunchbull, and some of the stagings are absolutely phenomenal. Others, sadly, are not, and the worst offender is the musical’s most iconic number — “When I Grow Up” — which is awkwardly and unconvincingly presented, for reasons that baffle the mind.
3. “The Witches” (1990)
Nicholas Roeg’s marvelously mean-spirited adaptation of “The Witches” is a horror story for children, about a little boy who runs afoul of a convention of supernatural child murderers and gets transformed into a mouse. Anjelica Huston is deliciously evil as the Grand High Witch, and the visual effects are grotesque and terrifying. But all those nightmares just make the hero’s accomplishments more suspenseful and impressive. Roeg’s film captures the best essence of Dahl’s children’s books, the inescapable sense that the world is out to destroy all children, and it’s up to all children to fight back however they can. Only the completely tacked-on happy ending feels out of place, finishing the film on an annoyingly unconvincing note.
2. “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” (1971)
Dahl notoriously hated the first live-action adaptation of “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,” which only goes to show that artists aren’t always the best judges of the adaptations of their own work. Mel Stuart’s superlative adaptation brings the infamous chocolate factory to fanciful life, while constantly reminding the audience that it’s only a brief respite from a terrible world, and that the terrible people who live in that world are bringing their sins in with them. Gene Wilder is instantly iconic as the mischievous and judgmental title character, dryly humorous and flipping between sensitive and obtuse whenever the whim takes over him.
1. “Fantastic Mr. Fox” (2009)
Wes Anderson has spent most of his filmmaking career telling stories about characters who transform their lives into dioramas, so it’s only fitting that his best film would literally be a detailed stop-motion showcase. A loose and exceptional adaptation of Dahl’s children’s story, about a clever fox (voiced by George Clooney) who steals livestock from detestable farmers. The film version expands on that very simple concept to tell a more complicated story about maturity, consequences and mid-life crises, with a spectacular cast of characters and perfectly peculiar animation. Funny and thoughtful, “Fantastic Mr. Fox” captures Dahl’s original tale while expanding it to fill the big screen, making it quintessentially Anderson and quintessentially Dahl.