The Princess Bride

Okay. I'm a cynic, but a cynic always waiting (and almost always unrewardedly so) to be charmed.

Movies that try to charm, that break out the corporate spreadsheet of "charming elements" and carefully laid out "moments", unfailingly fail to do so. Nothing charming ever came out of a suit. And make no mistake -- Hollywood is all about suits and spreadsheets. "Charm" is a celebrity 'Q rating' measurement, not a viable goal.

And yet, somehow, in spite of itself, Hollywood does occasionally produce pure and lovely charm. "The Princess Bride" is (with no close second) the most charming movie ever (in Tedworld, certainly, if not the rest of the knowable universe).

"The Princess Bride" is a fable set within a story; it is about the power of love to endure, the miracle of friendship, the gift of loyalty....and it is just as much about the importance of storytelling itself. It's about the power that a love story can have to open our own hearts to love.

Populated by the most bizarre set of fun characters -- from Christopher Guest's six-fingered count to Wallace Shawn's pompous screeching sicilian; from Peter Falk's bold grandfather to Fred Savage's nicely restrained turn as the sick boy; from Mandy Patinkin's driven swordsman ("My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.") to Cary Elwes' noble stableboy posing as the Dread Pirate Roberts (and who the heck ever named a pirate that?) -- "The Princess Bride" holds you riveted by the humor and intense likeability of the characters and the film itself.

Is it perfect? Well, probably not -- although the only minor quibble I can assert is that Billy Crystal and Carol Kane's brief scene is more full of Catskills schtick than actual characterization....but this is mere quibble, because schtick or not, their scene is fiercely funny, too.

This movie I love. This movie simply makes me glad that stories and storytellers still exist. This movie does nothing less than make me glad to be alive.

Cynicism begone.