THE PRINCESS BRIDE (1987)

Here's the short version: this is a landmark film, and it earns every bit of its reputation. Rob Reiner's direction, William Goldman's script, and a cast working at the top of their game combine into something rarely equaled — funny, romantic, adventurous, and quotable line after line.

What makes it more than a great comedy is what it believes. The story of Westley's pursuit of his Bride, his death and "resurrection," and his refusal to be held by death carries real Christological weight. It's a fairy tale built from older, more biblical bones than most modern stories dare use.

The caution is small but real: some swordplay and torture-scene violence, two mild profanities, a couple of suggestive lines about women, and creatures likely to startle little ones. None of it is heavy, but it's enough to make this a film for teens and adults rather than young kids. Watch it with your older children, and expect to quote it for years.

A grandfather (Peter Falk) reads his grandson (Fred Savage) a story he insists has "fencing, fighting, torture, revenge, giants, monsters, chases, escapes, true love, miracles." At its center: Buttercup (Robin Wright) and the farm boy Westley (Cary Elwes), who pledge undying love before he vanishes and is presumed dead. Years later, Buttercup is pressured into marrying another man entirely. Whether true love — and Westley — can find a way back is the adventure the rest of the film is built to answer.

Four stars, and the film earns them completely. Reiner's direction and Goldman's screenplay are described as masterful and sagacious, and the cast is called pitch-perfect and inspired — from Westley's heroism to Inigo Montoya's grammar-obsessed vengeance to Count Rugen's dark menace. The sets and cinematography hold up, and the tone threads comedy and adventure without either undercutting the other.

The source calls it exemplary and among the most quoted films of the century — endlessly imitated, rarely equaled. Little here is treated as a flaw; this is a film that simply works, scene after scene, joke after joke, right through to its earned happy ending.

This film's worldview is strongly biblical and moral, with genuine Christ imagery running underneath the comedy. Westley's pursuit of Buttercup despite her seeming waywardness, his willingness to face death and dangers for her sake, and his return from apparent death all point toward Christ's own pursuit of His Bride and His victory over death — "God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it" (Acts 2:24). Buttercup's growing devotion to her Beloved mirrors the way the Church is called to love Christ in return.

In a cultural moment where happy endings are rare and the antihero is standard, this story deliberately embodies an older, more hopeful tradition — what one classic essay on fairy tales calls the "Consolation" of the Happy Ending. That's worth celebrating on its own.

The film isn't flawless in its vision of love: a few lines drift into a Romantic, somewhat unbiblical view of love and desire, including a couple of suggestive remarks about women. These are minor notes in an otherwise strongly moral story, not the film's real character.

The ache this story answers — that death cannot be the final word for true love — finds its real answer not in fairy tales but in the empty tomb: "O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?" (1 Corinthians 15:55).

This is a rare thing: a film beloved by nearly everyone that also happens to be built from genuinely biblical bones. Reiner and Goldman gave us a fairy tale worth quoting for a lifetime, and underneath the comedy is a real picture of a Bridegroom who will not let death win. Our answer stands: worth the trip — teens and up. Watching with younger ones? Consider pairing it with a chat about the swordplay and a couple of the film's grown-up lines first.