The Princess Bride (1987)
Made a few years later but due to childhood viewing habits intertwined intimately with yesterdays reviewed film Krull. Of course this is a much, much better film.
As a child I generally liked it for being silly and exciting but as I watched it on growing up new levels were revealed to me. It is an incredibly smart, silly and exciting film. Filled with the joy of storytelling (giving it a thematic depth deeper than simply rescuing a princess).
The cast are generally excellent (Cary Elwes is occasionally beneath the material), a remake would be hard pressed to find anyone as perfect as Mandy Patinkin, Wallace Shawn and Andre the Giant.
The central device of the sick fred savage being told a story by his grandfather slyly allows for the metatextual commentary the source novel had with it's annotated notes without being too dry and who could be better than Peter Falk to tell you a bedside tale?
Rob Reiner is not the greatest visual stylist in the world, but the simple perfunctory direction allows the characters and jokes to take centre stage in a way that perhaps a more showy version of the film would not.
People often ask me what my favourite film is and I never have an answer because there are just too many that I love to bits but this is certainly up there. Pure magic.
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