This is a lovely movie and gets me on an emotional level for two different reasons, which I will get to no doubt later in the piece. Once I get through the usual insight of information and an attempt at the plot. This was released 1987 making this yet another 80’s movie on my list.
This was directed and produced by Rob Reiner (Andrew Scheinman co-produced) and was written by William Goldman who also wrote the book and he also wrote the Exorcist. Which he didn’t at all but I wanted to check you were actually paying attention. This had a list of stars and some having very small roles in the movie but the list is Cary Elwes, Mandy Patinkin, Chris Sarandon, Christopher Guest, Wallace Shawn, André the Giant, Robin Wright (Hayden is still dribbling over that one), Peter Falk, Fred Wolf, Peter Cook, Billy Crystal, Margery Mason and Mel Smith. Produced on a budget of $16m it went on to make $30.9m at the box office. The scoreboard isn’t being troubled again despite me and IMDb agreeing with their score of 8.1 out of 10. The real difference come with Rotten Tomatoes as they loved it so much more than me with a score of 97% and to be honest I am really not going to argue with that as this is such a nice film. Almost a forerunner for Shrek in certain ways which will be explained in the plot coming up now.
The story we watch is actually the story from a book being read to a very young Fred Wolf but we will breeze over that exchange to talk about the main story as this is a fairy tail written in the eighties. It begins with two lovers one the farmers daughter and a farm hand who would always say ‘As you wish’ whenever she asks anything. Over time she realises he means I love you and all the boys moan which includes Wolf. He leaves to seek his fortune but his ship is attacked by the Dread Pirate Roberts who is famous for not leaving survivors and he is assumed dead. Many years later the girl (called Buttercup) is being forced into marriage with the Prince no less. Prince Humperdinck is not the nicest but he is the heir to the throne of Florin. Before the wedding she is captured by three outlaws, a short Sicilian leader called Vizzini, a giant of a man called Fezzik and a Spaniard Inigo Montoya a fencing master. The outlaws are pursues by the prince and also a mask man that appears on the scene. The masked man catches up with the three on a cliff top and defeats each one in turn despite their own special abilities. He takes Buttercup and flees where she correctly guesses that he is the Dread Pirate Roberts and she attacks him for killing her love. I will stop there on the plot as the next section may be seen as spoilers for certain aspects of the story. All I can say is that only one of the three outlaws was killed by the pirate so they still have a part to play. The Prince’s henchman is more than meets the eye. As is the nasty Prince. Likewise is the Pirate and Buttercup has some work to do to unravel that lot!
As mentioned this is a lovely movie with so many horrible elements for the boys and lovey moments for the girls. If you want to stick to old school prejudices. For me it has everything from torture, murder, intrigue, clever elements and two men that I have very fond memories of. Firstly Mel Smith who I have already done my speech on and assume it would have been in Father Christmas review but it could be elsewhere. The one special one in this movie is André the Giant and if you don’t know who he is then go watch the documentary of his life. Well worth a watch and why I won’t go into one but this movie is a special moment in time where you can celebrate when he was at his peak and in his prime which for him was very young. Again, I digress and have come away from the movie and the many many reasons why you should watch this. If you don’t have kids then go watch this movie as there are many elements that you will like as it has so many different aspects to cover. The comedy, the cheesy swamp monsters, the albino (Smith) and the wiseman Billy Crystal who lays on layer and layer of Jewish stereotypes. If you do have kids and not toddles then I would recommend watching this movie with them as they will love as much as you do. Its one of those rare movies that works on so many levels because it hits so many different levels. It is lovable and that has to be good in my mind. If you haven’t seen this movie you really have missed a treat and you really should adjust that fact and give this lovable movie a go.
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