Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:

The Princess Bride (1987)

Buttercup: You mock my pain.

Man in Black: Life is pain, Highness.
Anyone who says differently is selling something.

Today is the 25th anniversary of Rob Reiner's classic flash of swashbuckling silliness - it came out on September 25th, 1987. The film only made about 30 million bucks when it came out, topping at #3 on the box office, but it got great reviews - it was home video that turned it into everybody's favorite movie of all time to quote in any and all situations. Personally I was a fan of Goldman's wonderful book before ever seeing the movie and so subsequently, naturally, I've always held a bit of a grudge against the film for omitting my beloved "Zoo of Death," which is a passage that lit my young imagination on fire.

That's not to say I don't like the movie - far from it! I am one of its legion of incessant quoters. And it's gotten two whole Ways Not To Die devoted to it, after all. See here for Westley's mostly death, and here for Vizzini's inconceivable demise. I don't think anybody around my age will ever not be in love with Princess Buttercup and her ever-devoted Westley.