This movie showed me what true love is. Without fear or limits, true love is powerful and very rare. Westley and Buttercup luckily found it. It is and always will be one of my favorite movies because it represents the purity of the human being. Something that nowadays doesn't happen, in my opinion.

Maybe a spoiler at the end....maybe. It is 2018 and this movie is now 31 years old. I am pushing 70 and have watched several thousand movies. For clean family-viewable entertainment, this has to be in almost everyone's all time top ten. Or five. Mandy Patinkin, a very fine actor, was never better than as Inigo Montoya, the Spanish swordsman. Robin Wright, barely 21, was exquisite as Buttercup. Cary Elwes has never, IMO, been quite as good as he was as Westley...but then, he was superlative as Westley, setting the bar very, very high. All of the acting ranges from good to great. The inclusion of Andre as Fezzik was random "geniusness"....it just worked, and worked oh so incredibly well. I have watched this movie many times and I still love it. The outer wrap of grandfather Peter Falk reading the story to his grandson Fred Savage takes the "Family Friendliness" rating to a fifty on a 1-10 scale. There are many, many characters to enjoy in this fanciful tale; my personal favorite has always been Inigo Montoya. The sword fight scene remains, for me, one of the finest pieces of dramatic comedy I've ever seen, no matter who was the victor.

A lot of people and critics believe 'The Princess Bride' is a masterpiece and some even believe it is one of the greatest films ever made. However, objectively speaking the movie is not a masterpiece but primarily a highly entertaining escapism flick which still far outweighs its negative sides.Not entirely sure why the film was told out of a book straight from another modern day story, because the modern scenes really seem to have little significance and it also eventually ends up going nowhere. Fortunately, most scenes take place in the historical fantasy setting, which is obviously far and away the most entertaining one. The cinematography is beautiful, with a lot of stunning shots of the beautiful british landscapes where it was filmed on. Also the area where Inigo and the Man in Black face off is worthy of mention as a beautiful piece of cinematography. While being covered in comic aspects, the said scene with the sword fight between Inigo and Man in Black is actually also a masterpiece of choreography and incredible moves, resulting in possibly the greatest single duel swordfight one can ever see in film.The acting was mostly good, especially by leads Cary Elwes, Mandy Patinkin & Robin Wright. They manage to make their characters likeable due to their natural charm and witty line delivery. A lot of other characters were ridiculously overacted, such as Wallace Shawn's Vizzini. The screenplay is a bit wobbly as a lot of the dialogue is extremely witty and original yet Patinkin's constant uttering of 'Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die.' grows tiresome after a while. Some things are really predictable such as who the Man in Black really is but other things such as Count Rugen's response to the first time Patinkin says the you killed by father line are quite original and somewhat hilarious.It is quite the cliché to say if this movie was serious we might take Elwes & Wright's romance and struggles emotionally serious, but there is still truth to it as it is not the kind of film that leaves you with feelings or thought long after it is finished. It was generally just made as the type of feel good escapism flick and if you limit your expectations of true cinema it can still be considered as a worthy piece of entertaining art. However, anything transcendent or thought provoking it is obviously not therefore it should not be judged like actual masterpieces.

On my own, I would never have watched this movie based on the title alone. But it's in the IMDb 'Top 250', so as I manage my viewing to go through that list, this one came up in it's proper turn. I'd have to say this one was more than a surprise. It was fairly entertaining and I don't mind saying it had the very best sword fight I've ever seen in any movie, which is saying something because I've seen Errol Flynn, Tyrone Power and Douglas Fairbanks in action, and I don't think any of them could have held their own with either Dread Pirate Roberts/Farm Boy Westley (Cary Elwes) or Inigo Montoya (Mandy Patinkin). Now there could have been some special effects involved there, but if so, it wasn't transparent. Those two put on quite a show.The story also had a few pretty cool concepts like the shrieking eels and the Cliffs of Insanity. The Fire Swamp and the Lightning Sand were kind of original too. The convoluted turn of phrase that old Vizzini (Wallace Shawn) engaged in trying to outwit the Dread Pirate was pretty amusing, and if you try to keep up with it you'll be hopelessly lost, so best not even to try. It was also neat to see Andre the Giant in the film, one of the wrestling world's all time favorites. Interesting, but when he spoke he sounded kind of normal, unlike his in-character TV interviews where he had a much more guttural and heavily accented voice.With all that going on, it's easy to forget that the Princess Bride tale is a story within a story, as a grandfather (Peter Falk) attempts to carry on a long family tradition of reading a favorite book to his grandson (Fred Savage). It doesn't sound very favorable at the outset with the romance and the 'eeeuw' kissing, but the kid warms up to the story when it sounds like there will be some action and adventure. If I had to come up with a minor nit-pick, it seemed like the picture got a bit more slapstick in the final third of the movie. Otherwise the humor was well placed and I thought it made for fine family fare.