After 30 years, the wit, fun, charm and idealism are fresher than ever. The Princess Bride, adapted by William Goldman from his novel and directed by Rob Reiner, now makes a brief reappearance in UK cinemas. Catch it while you can. My colleague Hadley Freeman has a magisterial chapter on it in her memoir of 1980s Hollywood, Life Moves Pretty Fast, showing how it made possible fairytale homages and Shrek and Frozen and also affected the language of irony and comedy in the television pop culture that came afterwards. It’s a movie that manages to be both a pastiche and a fervently real love story. The Princess Bride is an organically grown comedy romance from an analogue age: different from the genetically modified, digital creations that came along later. And there is a specific kind of poignancy given how two of its stars have since achieved new fame in TV dramas of cynicism and disillusionment: Robin Wright with House of Cards and Mandy Patinkin in Homeland.
Cary Elwes plays the impossibly handsome farmhand Westley who is devoted to the beautiful, headstrong young noblewoman who capriciously bosses him about on her country estate: this is the whimsically named Buttercup, beguilingly played by Wright. They fall in love, but are instantly sundered by a political conspiracy planned by the deplorable Prince Humperdinck (Chris Sarandon), who has his own designs on Buttercup’s person, and his loathsome attendant Count Rugen (Christopher Guest). Westley and Buttercup are also to encounter the cynical plotter Vizzini (Wallace Shawn) but they also find two true friends: hot-headed Spanish swordsman Inigo Montoya (Patinkin) and the man-mountain Fezzik, lovably and unselfconsciously played by the 7ft 4in wrestler André the Giant.
The comedy has something of Douglas Adams, Monty Python and Mel Brooks, but Reiner and Goldman ensure that the gags and comedy style are always lightly handled, laugh-lines delivered modestly, and all subordinate to a story told absolutely straight. It’s an adventure which reaches back to golden-age Hollywood and the devil-may-care world of Douglas Fairbanks or Tyrone Power playing Zorro, or Errol Flynn playing Robin Hood.
Perhaps the most striking thing now about The Princess Bride is the framing device: it’s a story being told by a kindly grandfather, played by Peter Falk – but to a little boy, not a little girl. There isn’t the same gender stereotyping you’d find if the story were pitched today, and despite the title, The Princess Bride is not a tweeny sleepover movie like Frozen. Buttercup is not indulged with lonely monologues, and there is no great interest in how she feels. What counts with her is bold and resourceful action.
The location work and production design are wonderful and the funny situations are glorious: it’s an inspired moment when poor Buttercup disappears into quicksand and Westley dives in to save her – and we, the audience, are left up at ground level, tensely wondering what can be happening down there. It’s a nutritious pleasure to see The Princess Bride back on the big screen.
