India Opal Buloni (AnnaSophia Robb) is a lonely 10-year-old girl who has just moved to the small town of Naomi, Florida with her father, a preacher (Jeff Daniels). The move has resulted in her losing all her friends, and she now has to make new ones.
While in the Winn-Dixie supermarket that summer, she encounters a scruffy dog that is wreaking havoc. She claims that it is hers, and names it Winn-Dixie. She discovers that Winn-Dixie becomes friends with everyone he encounters, and she makes some new friends in the process. She also rekindles the relationship with her father, and learns ten things about her mother who abandoned them seven years ago. Opal describes the preacher to Winn-Dixie as an old turtle, always sticking his head into his turtle shell and never wanting to come out into the real world, most likely because of how sad he is about her mother, who he is still in love with.
One of the people Opal meets is Miss Franny Block (Eva Marie Saint), a kind and somewhat eccentric elder librarian, who tells her many great stories and runs the Herman W. Block Memorial Library. She also meets Gloria Dump (Cicely Tyson), a blind recovering alcoholic with a mistake tree in her backyard that has beer bottles hanging from it, the ghosts of all the things she's done wrong. With the help of Gloria, Opal also plants a tree to see if she has her mother's green thumb, which was one of the ten things.
Two boys, Dunlap and Stevie Dewberry (Luke Benward and Nick Price), tease Opal about spending her time with old ladies, and believe that Gloria is a witch. Opal also gets a job at Gertrude's Pets in order to be able to pay for an expensive leash and collar for Winn-Dixie, and befriends a worker there, Otis (Dave Matthews), a shy ex-convict with a passion for music. She also meets a girl named Sweetie Pie Thomas (Elle Fanning) who is eager to get a dog like Winn-Dixie and invites Opal to her sixth birthday party in September. Suddenly, Opal feels happy that she's made so many friends, learning many things from each of them and finding out that each of them has a sad and lonely past.
Opal soon decides to read a book to Gloria because Gloria's eyes are far too bad for her to be able to read. Miss Franny suggests Gone With The Wind, a book about the Civil War, and asks Opal if she knows about it. Just then, the "pinch-faced" Amanda Wilkinson (Courtney Jines), enters, and Miss Franny decides to tell them both a story about her great-grandfather Littmus who fought in the Civil War and lost his entire family to disease. Littmus then created the world famous candy, the Littmus Lozenge, with a flavour of strawberry and root beer that tastes both sweet and sad at the same time. Miss Franny reveals her desk is full of the lozenges, and gives Amanda and Opal some. Amanda cries once she tastes one and says it reminds her of Carson, running out of the library.
Opal then takes some lozenges to all her new friends, Gloria, Sweetie Pie, Otis, and the preacher. They all comment on how sad it tastes, the preacher describing it as "melancholy" and saying it reminds him of Opal's mother. Opal also asks him about Carson, and he explains that he was Amanda's five-year-old brother who drowned the previous year. Opal suddenly realizes why Amanda is always so pinch-faced, and feels sorry for her, noting that Carson was the same age as Sweetie Pie, but he would never get to have his sixth birthday party.
Soon Opal and Gloria decide to hold a party because of an idea Opal got from Gone With The Wind, and invite everyone, even Dunlap and Stevie Dewberry. But when a storm hits, Winn-Dixie runs away (he has a pathological fear of thunderstorms), and Opal and the preacher look for him for a long time. Before they leave, Gloria tells Opal that she can't try to hold on to something that wants to go, that she can only love what she has while she has it. While she's looking, Opal thinks up ten things about Winn-Dixie that she could put on a lost dog poster, but realizes that would never help find him, nor would it help her ever find her mother. She and the preacher cry for awhile about both her mother and Winn-Dixie, and soon come back to Gloria's house, but Winn-Dixie returns to Gloria's house soon afterwards, and the film ends happily.
While in the Winn-Dixie supermarket that summer, she encounters a scruffy dog that is wreaking havoc. She claims that it is hers, and names it Winn-Dixie. She discovers that Winn-Dixie becomes friends with everyone he encounters, and she makes some new friends in the process. She also rekindles the relationship with her father, and learns ten things about her mother who abandoned them seven years ago. Opal describes the preacher to Winn-Dixie as an old turtle, always sticking his head into his turtle shell and never wanting to come out into the real world, most likely because of how sad he is about her mother, who he is still in love with.
One of the people Opal meets is Miss Franny Block (Eva Marie Saint), a kind and somewhat eccentric elder librarian, who tells her many great stories and runs the Herman W. Block Memorial Library. She also meets Gloria Dump (Cicely Tyson), a blind recovering alcoholic with a mistake tree in her backyard that has beer bottles hanging from it, the ghosts of all the things she's done wrong. With the help of Gloria, Opal also plants a tree to see if she has her mother's green thumb, which was one of the ten things.
Two boys, Dunlap and Stevie Dewberry (Luke Benward and Nick Price), tease Opal about spending her time with old ladies, and believe that Gloria is a witch. Opal also gets a job at Gertrude's Pets in order to be able to pay for an expensive leash and collar for Winn-Dixie, and befriends a worker there, Otis (Dave Matthews), a shy ex-convict with a passion for music. She also meets a girl named Sweetie Pie Thomas (Elle Fanning) who is eager to get a dog like Winn-Dixie and invites Opal to her sixth birthday party in September. Suddenly, Opal feels happy that she's made so many friends, learning many things from each of them and finding out that each of them has a sad and lonely past.
Opal soon decides to read a book to Gloria because Gloria's eyes are far too bad for her to be able to read. Miss Franny suggests Gone With The Wind, a book about the Civil War, and asks Opal if she knows about it. Just then, the "pinch-faced" Amanda Wilkinson (Courtney Jines), enters, and Miss Franny decides to tell them both a story about her great-grandfather Littmus who fought in the Civil War and lost his entire family to disease. Littmus then created the world famous candy, the Littmus Lozenge, with a flavour of strawberry and root beer that tastes both sweet and sad at the same time. Miss Franny reveals her desk is full of the lozenges, and gives Amanda and Opal some. Amanda cries once she tastes one and says it reminds her of Carson, running out of the library.
Opal then takes some lozenges to all her new friends, Gloria, Sweetie Pie, Otis, and the preacher. They all comment on how sad it tastes, the preacher describing it as "melancholy" and saying it reminds him of Opal's mother. Opal also asks him about Carson, and he explains that he was Amanda's five-year-old brother who drowned the previous year. Opal suddenly realizes why Amanda is always so pinch-faced, and feels sorry for her, noting that Carson was the same age as Sweetie Pie, but he would never get to have his sixth birthday party.
Soon Opal and Gloria decide to hold a party because of an idea Opal got from Gone With The Wind, and invite everyone, even Dunlap and Stevie Dewberry. But when a storm hits, Winn-Dixie runs away (he has a pathological fear of thunderstorms), and Opal and the preacher look for him for a long time. Before they leave, Gloria tells Opal that she can't try to hold on to something that wants to go, that she can only love what she has while she has it. While she's looking, Opal thinks up ten things about Winn-Dixie that she could put on a lost dog poster, but realizes that would never help find him, nor would it help her ever find her mother. She and the preacher cry for awhile about both her mother and Winn-Dixie, and soon come back to Gloria's house, but Winn-Dixie returns to Gloria's house soon afterwards, and the film ends happily.
