The Princess Bride

I like both the movie and the book, too, but I have to say that if I had to choose one, it would be the book. Yes, the movie is faithful in a lot of ways, but I think the book was a work of genius. Sure, Goldman did both the book and the screenplay, but he originally envisioned the story as a novel, and you can tell. Of course, if you liked the movie more, you could argue that he wrote the screenplay later and therefore probably wrote what he thought was a better version of the story.

I think the backstory on all of the characters in the book is priceless, and the whole end with the Zoo of Death, and the cliffhanger ending.... If you haven't read the book, you've got to. Get the 25th Anniversary Edition if you can. It's even out in paperback now.

I hear they're working on a special edition of the movie on DVD for release in 2002. Apparently Rob Reiner is working on it in between other projects (as well as a special edition of A Few Good Men, another favorite of mine). I can't wait.

And no, there's no Morgenstern, and no, the stuff about Goldman's family isn't true, either. In real life he *was* married to an Ilene (who took a lot of photos of him that were on his books--now they're split up, BTW) and had two daughters (Jenny and I can't remember the other name off the top of my head), not like in the book where he was married to a genius shrink named Helen and a fat son named Jason.

His two daughters were actually his inspiration for the The Princess Bride. He asked them what they wanted him to write about. One said "A princess," and the other said "A bride."

Blah blah blah. I'll shut up now.

C.V.
www.smorgenstern.com