Matilda

My brother took me to this back in the 70s, and I loved it. And only recently found it again. No, it's not Citizen Kane or Vertigo, but it is a fun little story similar to Gus the Kicking Mule and The Cat from Outer Space (which is the best of those cheap but fun Disney movies of that era). This is a fun, cute and very silly movie that actually has good acting and a very bad faked Kangaroo. If it's snowing on a Saturday or you are in lockdown, it's a fun romp to watch with the kids.

I was fortunate as a 12-year old to see this film at Radio City Music Hall, as one of the last regular engagements before the Music Hall converted to a concert hall. I don't remember much about the film and won't try and defend it, but it was exciting to see it in the context of a Radio City presentation, complete with Rockettes and organ and all!

It's a shame that there haven't been more films shown on that great and grand screen. I don't know why films like TITANIC and THE DARK KNIGHT and WALL-E wouldn't have worked a treat there for short runs at the start of their lives.

It is a blessing that the theatre is intact and still gloriously vibrant and active. What a joy to experience, even peripherally, the thrill that our parents and grandparents felt when going to the movies.

Extremely bad, deservedly one of the biggest financial disasters of the decade. There was little potential in a supposed feel-good kiddie movie about a boxing kangaroo trying to beat the human world champion, but it didn't have to be this bad. For instance, they could have trained a real kangaroo instead of using a ham actor in a cheap, heavy, molting kangaroo suit that bears no resemblance to an animal, even with the animatronic facial expressions. And if you've ever wondered why Elliot Gould's career tanked in the late seventies, this is a big reason. He tries to make up for the bad kangaroo by hamming it up and desperately trying to be cute. And they didn't have to have such an annoying, sexist romance subplot either.

Incredibly bad, but not enjoyably bad like an Ed Wood film. For serious Bad Film buffs only.

This film's problems are numerous and in your face from the get-go. Start with the ridiculous toupee worn by the British former champion who owns Matilda, the boxing kangaroo. Matilda is a guy in a fur suit. He looks less like a real kangaroo than I look like a blue whale. The script and dialogue are pure garbage. But Elliot Gould, who had just done Nashville, The Long Goodbye and A Bridge Too Far and was still considered a star, read the script and thought it was fine, which shows how bad his judgment was. This was the beginning of the end for his career, which was probably inevitable since he was always a talentless hack anyway. To say Gould embarrasses himself here would be an understatement.

I suppose this was intended as a kid's film, but I saw it when I was about 8 years old and I hated it then too. What a piece of crap.

This film is bad, yes, but had the producers used a REAL KANGAROO, it would have killed the actor it was boxing with. I am an Australian and I have seen two seven foot tall male 'Roos fighting each other, it is not a pretty sight as the object is for one or the other to kill it's opponent,(this is there way of securing the herd of females) and there are incidents where someone has boxed a kangaroo, and been injured or killed, so when you see a kangaroo on TV or Film it is likely to be a female, or Animated, as it is a good idea not to injure actors (they might be annoyed at losing the ability to breath). There is a strange idea that Australian animals are cute and cuddly, that is false, many are dangerous (10 of the 12 most deadliest snakes live here)and most are just plain ugly (Koalas are as soft as steal wool). So if you come to Australia BE CAREFULL!!!