# I'm not really feeling the love the for "The Princess Bride." **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 8, 2014, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046 "2014-11-08T05:04:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/21 "2014-11-08T15:49:31Z")
I feel similarly about “The Goonies”. But I don’t HATE The Goonies, I just think it’s somewhat overrated. ---
**Author:** ![Sir\_Prize](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d2c977/32.png) [@Sir\_Prize](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sir_Prize)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/22 "2014-11-08T16:12:58Z")
> [@sinjin](#): > > It would probably help if you read the book first. I loved the book when it first came out (I am old) and years later read the book with my kids before I took them to the movie which was just coming out. We all still love it. It’s a silly story about TRUUUUUUUUUU LUUUUUUV, YMMV 🙂 To this day whenever I ask my husband to do anything he responds “As you wish” Yeah, we’re lame. I loved the book so I was excited when the movie come out. But the movie was a letdown. Maybe I would have liked the movie more if I didn’t have high expectations from the book. ---
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/23 "2014-11-08T16:48:05Z")
> [@John\_DiFool](#): > > [Recent thread that I guess that you missed where all of this was already hashed out](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=736509). Thank you. I was swearing we just had this exact conversation. Deja vu. Again. ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_R.Mortiss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim_r.mortiss/32/142_2.png) [@Tim\_R.Mortiss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_R.Mortiss)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/24 "2014-11-08T16:58:41Z")
I was underwhelmed. But then, I’m a big fan of Errol Flynn swashbucklers, and it just can’t compete with those. Not that it was trying to, I get that, but in my mind it suffered by comparison. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/25 "2014-11-08T17:11:45Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > That’s ok. Everybody can be mind-blowingly, disasterously **wrong** about something and still be a good person. Exactly. Different squids for different kids and all, but some opinions are just _wrong_. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/26 "2014-11-08T17:55:18Z")
Around five years ago, I saw that a (now ex) girl friend of mine had a DVD of the movie so I watched it to see what all of the fuss was about. I thought that it was completely awful but I just wrote it off to not being my type of humor and not having first seen the movie when I was a kid. ---
**Author:** ![diggerwam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/919ad9/32.png) [@diggerwam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/diggerwam)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/27 "2014-11-08T19:07:52Z")
I agremoments . It general, meh. ---
**Author:** ![erysichthon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d07c76/32.png) [@erysichthon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erysichthon)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/28 "2014-11-08T19:52:39Z")
> [@John\_DiFool](#): > > [Recent thread that I guess that you missed where all of this was already hashed out](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=736509). I saw that thread. The OP claimed that TPB is “half a great movie,” followed by lots of people saying “no no no, it’s 100 percent great from start to finish!” This thread is completely different, as we are asserting that it’s zero percent great. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![erysichthon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d07c76/32.png) [@erysichthon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erysichthon)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/29 "2014-11-08T20:01:01Z")
> [@Rachellelogram](#): > > I love it. Didn’t watch the movie before my 20s, so nostalgia’s not an excuse. But then, everybody likes different things. That’s why there’s so much stuff out there, you know? > > Not to be a negative nancy, but if everyone made threads about everything they hated, this board would be saturated with complaints 24/7. I’ve only been on this board for a couple of years, and one of the first things I noticed is that _The Princess Bride_ is the _Citizen Kane_ of the Doperverse. This was was a bit disorienting, as I’ve mostly ignored the movie since suffering through it 27 years ago. I see your point about “I Don’t Like \” threads, which I generally tune out. However, it’s mildly comforting to see some evidence that I’m not the sole outlier here. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/30 "2014-11-08T20:11:32Z")
> [@Rachellelogram](#): > > Not to be a negative nancy, but if everyone made threads about everything they hated, this board would be saturated with complaints 24/7. People post threads about things they love all the time, and yet the board isn’t saturated with fanboy/fangirl stuff 24/7. And even if it were, so what? I’ve never seen “The Princess Bride”, though I’ve come close to watching it a couple of times just to see what the hype is all about. A long time ago, a guy who’s really into Monty Python-esque humor recommended it to me. This makes me suspect the film isn’t up my alley. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/31 "2014-11-08T20:33:25Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > I feel like it must be a nostalgia thing. > > I found the movie worth watching, at least once. But overall yeah, underwhelmed. It’s just a nice little film, if you only watch it once. But, back when there was TV, people had to choose whether to watch something they had seen before again, simply because it was on. There might only be two mediocre options to choose from at any given time, and you’re stuck choosing one of those or (gasp) going out and doing something active. When you’re effectively forced to rewatch perfectly decent films over and over again, some will bubble to the top as having far more rewatchability value than others. Some will have initially seemed equally as passable. But as time goes on, you realize that one of them you really just couldn’t stomach having to watch again, while this other one you’re positively ecstatic that you get to watch. If you didn’t like it the first time, then that’s probably where it ends. But for anyone else, if you’ve watched it a half dozen times, you’ll come to realize that it’s really a great piece of cinema. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/32 "2014-11-08T20:38:51Z")
It really isn’t like Monty Python. There’s a large overlap in the fanbases, but that’s mostly just because both are liked by a lot of nerds. ---
**Author:** ![Penfeather](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penfeather/32/384_2.png) [@Penfeather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Penfeather)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/33 "2014-11-08T21:04:35Z")
> [@sinjin](#): > > It would probably help if you read the book first. I loved the book when it first came out (I am old) and years later read the book with my kids before I took them to the movie which was just coming out. We all still love it. It’s a silly story about TRUUUUUUUUUU LUUUUUUV, YMMV 🙂 To this day whenever I ask my husband to do anything he responds “As you wish” Yeah, we’re lame. The book wasn’t all that, either. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/34 "2014-11-08T22:43:35Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > I’ve never seen “The Princess Bride”, though I’ve come close to watching it a couple of times just to see what the hype is all about. A long time ago, a guy who’s really into Monty Python-esque humor recommended it to me. This makes me suspect the film isn’t up my alley. It may or may not be up your alley, but I wouldn’t describe the humor in _The Princess Bride_ as Monty Python-ish. There’s not really anything surreal or absurdist about it, and despite the somewhat similar setting it’s a very, very different sort of movie than _Monty Python and the Holy Grail_. Most of the overt humor in _The Princess Bride_ is old-fashioned bantering dialogue, which is what has led to it being quoted so much. The movie also has some fun playing with tropes of the swashbuckling romance genre, although I wouldn’t really say it’s satirizing them. IMHO it feels more like the work of people that have genuine affection for the genre but were at the same time aware that it was all a bit dated and silly. I suspect this aspect of the movie is lost on a lot of people who watched it for the first time as adults in recent years. For children _The Princess Bride_ probably still works pretty well as a straightforward swashbuckling romance, but I don’t think many adults would take it seriously on that level…nor do I think it was ever really intended to be. But since this is a 27 year old movie that didn’t have a large budget or cutting-edge effects even by the standards of its time, some things that I think were deliberately or knowingly a bit dated and silly probably now come across as being _unintentionally_ dated and silly. And of course there are inevitably some things about the movie, such as the music, that did wind up becoming unintentionally dated. That said, I shudder to think what _The Princess Bride_ would be like if it were made today. It would probably be full of pop culture “jokes” and would have a 20-minute epic battle scene crammed into the final act. ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2014, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/35 "2014-11-08T23:55:50Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > People post threads about things they love all the time, and yet the board isn’t saturated with fanboy/fangirl stuff 24/7. And even if it were, so what? > > I’ve never seen “The Princess Bride”, though I’ve come close to watching it a couple of times just to see what the hype is all about. A long time ago, a guy who’s really into Monty Python-esque humor recommended it to me. This makes me suspect the film isn’t up my alley. I hate everything Monty Python. I do not find it funny at all. In fact, I find it all extremely unfunny. I can’t even bear to watch anything having to do with Monty Python. That all being said, The Princess Bride is one of my favorite movies. They’re not the same, as far as I can tell, so if that’s what’s stopping you, don’t let it. I think it may be largely dependent on when you see it. I saw The Princess Bride around when it first came out, so I was a kid still. I can see an adult watching it and not really finding it all that funny or amusing. However, much like a few others have said in here: > [@silenus](#): > > That’s ok. Everybody can be mind-blowingly, disasterously **wrong** about something and still be a good person. > [@Telemark](#): > > Exactly. Different squids for different kids and all, but some opinions are just _wrong_. > > :eek: I am tempted to say “I agree”. When I first read the OP here, my first thought was “Okay, opinions can’t be wrong, but I think the OP is the MOST wrong an opinion can get, if possible” ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2014, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/36 "2014-11-09T00:14:01Z")
> [@Idle\_Thoughts](#): > > I hate everything Monty Python. I do not find it funny at all. In fact, I find it all extremely unfunny. I can’t even bear to watch anything having to do with Monty Python. > That all being said, The Princess Bride is one of my favorite movies. They’re not the same, as far as I can tell, so if that’s what’s stopping you, don’t let it. In fairness, the bit with the albino in the pit of despair is fairly Python-ish. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2014, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/37 "2014-11-09T00:16:16Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > I still like it but the synthesized sound track really distracts me. Hmm. Are you thinking of _Ladyhawke_? ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2014, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/38 "2014-11-09T00:51:27Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > Hmm. Are you thinking of _Ladyhawke_? No, the music in Princess Bride is all synthesizer versions of real instruments. There was a past thread where I brought this up, and someone asked if I was sure so I went and found confirmation, so I know I’m not crazy. But I have no recollection of what the confirmation was that I found, so for all _you_ know, I’m crazy. But anyway, all the music is synthesized and I can’t get over it, though when it first came out I didn’t notice. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2014, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/39 "2014-11-09T00:52:37Z")
Here’s a clip for reference: [Princess Bride Dream Of Large Women - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EE2TZAdoaS8) ETA [here’s a wikipedia article](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Princess_Bride_(album)) about the soundtrack which confirms it’s performed by two people on keyboards. Possibly some of the guitar is real, it’s hard to say for sure from the wording of the article. ETA: Haha sorry last linke but here’s some random internet person who shares my distaste, which I post simply as further confirmation that it’s synthesizer: [http://streamingsarah.com/index.php/all-reviews/the-princess-bride-mark-knopfler-1987/](http://streamingsarah.com/index.php/all-reviews/the-princess-bride-mark-knopfler-1987/) ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2014, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046/40 "2014-11-09T01:00:31Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > No, the music in Princess Bride is all synthesizer versions of real instruments. There was a past thread where I brought this up, and someone asked if I was sure so I went and found confirmation, so I know I’m not crazy. But I have no recollection of what the confirmation was that I found, so for all _you_ know, I’m crazy. [I don’t mean to be rude, but this is not as easy as it looks, so I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t distract me.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=385113) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-not-really-feeling-the-love-the-for-the-princess-bride/704046.md?page=3)