The Princess Bride (1987) * * *

 

Directed by:  Rob Reiner

Starring: Cary Elwes, Robin Wright, Andre the Giant, Mandy Patinkin, Chris Sarandon, Billy Crystal, Carol Kane, Christopher Guest, Wallace Shawn, Peter Falk, Fred Savage  

The Princess Bride was Rob Reiner's third feature film, and he showed he could handle tricky material.  He was not a director who simply made films in one genre, although his first three films before Misery (1990) were comedies.  He had a deft touch, and The Princess Bride displayed that.  It's an amusing movie which overloads with the cuteness often, but the cast is having a great time and Reiner clearly loves the material. 

Based on William Goldman's book, The Princess Bride begins with a grandfather (Falk) reading a story to his sick grandson (Savage) about a lowly farmhand named Westley (Elwes) who falls in love with Buttercup (Wright) but is soon kidnapped into piracy and feared dead.  Buttercup is then forced into an arranged marriage to Prince Humperdinck (Sarandon), who is itching to go to war with a neighboring nation and plans to murder Buttercup on his wedding night and blame it on his enemies.  This is heavy stuff for a grandpop to read to his grandson, but the kid grows interested after at first dismissing the story out of hand because of all the kissing.  

Westley soon returns to rescue Buttercup and encounters a vengeful Prince Humperdinck, Spanish swordsman (Patinkin) Inigo Montoya, who is seeking vengeance on the man who killed his father, a giant named Fezzik (Andre the Giant, who else?), and a devious genius (Shawn) who may outsmart himself at the worst possible time.  Then there's the six-fingered henchman (Guest) who carries out the prince's orders with glee.  These are colorful characters who try to show off too much color sometimes, but the actors are having a ball with this material.  Reiner expressed how much he loved the book and was stonewalled trying to adapt it into a movie because it doesn't follow traditional medieval story arcs.  The Princess Bride is anything but typical, and in most cases, that's a delightful attribute.