The Worst Witch

Mildred Hubble is a first-year student at Miss Cackle's Academy, a boarding school where girls are trained in witchcraft. Clumsy and endlessly accident-prone, she becomes known among pupils and staff as the worst witch in the school. Her troubles take a more serious turn when the headmistress's twin sister, Agatha, sets out to ruin the academy, and Mildred finds herself in a position to stop her before a Halloween visit from the Grand Wizard. The film adapts Jill Murphy's books and mixes fantasy and comedy with musical numbers.

Robert Young directed, following Vampire Circus (1972) and preceding Fierce Creatures (1997). Mary Pleshette Willis wrote the screenplay and Colin Shindler produced for the British broadcaster ITV Central. Fairuza Balk plays Mildred, with Charlotte Rae in the dual role of Miss Cackle and Agatha. Diana Rigg appears as the formidable teacher Constance Hardbroom and Tim Curry as the Grand Wizard, among a credited cast of twenty-two. The film runs seventy minutes.

On IMDb it holds a rating of 6.8 from around 3,500 votes, a solid figure that reflects a fond following for a television production made nearly four decades ago. The much smaller vote count on TMDB, thirty-seven, puts that site's average lower at 6.1; with so few votes there, that number carries little weight. The IMDb score is the more meaningful measure of how the film has been received.