The Princess Bride (film)/Awesome

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Westley

  • We are men of action. Lies do not become us.
  • The entire To the Pain speech.
  • "It's possible, Pig, I might be bluffing. It's conceivable, you miserable, vomitous mass, that I'm only lying here because I lack the strength to stand. But, then again... perhaps I have the strength after all. Drop. Your. Sword."
  • "They were both poisoned."
  • Climbing the Cliffs of Insanity, Vizzini cuts the rope the Man in Black was using...only to see that he is still climbing the sheer cliffs with his bare hands.

Inigo Montoya

Inigo: HELLO! MY NAME IS INIGO MONTOYA! YOU KILLED MY FATHER! PREPARE TO DIE!
[Inigo corners Count Rugen and slashes his cheek, just like the slash he gave to Inigo as a child, then starts taunting him']
Inigo: Offer me money.
Rugen: Yes!
Inigo: Power, too, promise me that.
[another slash]
Rugen: All that I have and more. Please...
Inigo: Offer me everything I ask for.
Rugen: Anything you want...
[Rugen knocks Inigo's sword aside and lunges. But Inigo traps his arm and stabs his sword into Rugen's stomach]
Inigo: "I want my father back, you son of a bitch!"

    • There is more awesome to be had when you realize how thoroughly Inigo is in command of this fight, as soon as he gets his second wind. It's not just the cheek slashes; he gives back to Rugen every single wound the latter gave to him, with precision.
  • The whole fight is awesome. From the book:

Slowly, inch by inch, Inigo forced his body up the wall, using his legs just for pushing, letting the wall do all the supporting that was necessary.
Count Rugen struck again, but for any number of reasons, most probably because he hadn't expected the other man's movement, he missed the heart and had to be content with driving his blade through the Spaniard's left arm.
Inigo didn't mind. He didn't even feel it. His right arm was where his interest lay, and he squeezed the handle and there was strength in his hand, enough to flick out at the enemy, and Count Rugen hadn't expected that either, so he gave a little involuntary cry and took a step back to reassess the situation.
Power was flowing up from Inigo's heart to his right shoulder and down from his shoulder to his fingers and then into the great six-fingered sword and he pushed off from the wall then, with a whispered, ". . . hello . . . my name is . . . Inigo Montoya; you killed . . . my father; prepare to die."
And they crossed swords.
The Count went for the quick kill, the inverse Bonetti.
No chance.
"Hello . . . my name is Inigo Montoya; you killed my father . . . prepare to die. . . ."
Again they crossed, and the Count moved into a Morozzo defense, because the blood was still streaming.
Inigo shoved his fist deeper into himself. "Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya; you killed my father; prepare to die."
The Count retreated around the billiard table.
Inigo slipped in his own blood.
The Count continued to retreat, waiting, waiting.
"Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya; you killed my father; prepare to die." He dug with his fist and he didn't want to think what he was touching and pushing and holding into place but for the first time he felt able to try a move, so the six-fingered sword flashed forward—
—and there was a cut down one side of Count Rugen's cheek—
—another flash—
—another cut, parallel, bleeding—
"Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya; you killed my father; prepare to die."
"Stop saying that!" The Count was beginning to experience a decline of nerve.
Inigo drove for the Count's left shoulder, as the Count had wounded his. Then he went through the Count's left arm, at the same spot the Count had penetrated his. "Hello." Stronger now.
"Hello! HELLO. MY NAME IS INIGO MONTOYA. YOU KILLED MY FATHER. PREPARE TO DIE!"
"No—"
"Offer me money—"
"Everything," the Count said.
"Power too. Promise me that."
"All I have and more. Please."
"Offer me anything I ask for."
"Yes. Yes. Say it."
"I WANT DOMINGO MONTOYA, YOU SON OF A BITCH," and the six-fingered sword flashed again.
The Count screamed.
"That was just to the left of your heart." Inigo struck again.
Another scream.
"That was below your heart. Can you guess what I'm doing?"
"Cutting my heart out."
"You took mine when I was ten; I want yours now. We are lovers of justice, you and I—what could be more just than that?"
The Count screamed one final time then fell dead of fear.

Westley and Inigo

Buttercup

  • "You can't hurt me. Westley and I are joined by the bonds of love. And you cannot track that, not with a thousand bloodhounds. And you cannot break it, not with a thousand swords. And when I say you are a coward, that is only because you are the slimiest weakling ever to crawl the earth."
  • I-I-I... AM... THE... QUEEEEEEEEEEN.

The Grandfather

  • The sardonic, punctuating wit with which he keeps his grandson in place needs to turn up just a few times to be highly memorable. One of the best bits:

Yes. You're very smart. Shut up.

Fezzik

  • "The Dread Pirate Roberts has come for your SOUUUUUULLLLLL!"
  • The villains' last line of defense: A cleverly-hidden poisonous green spider, on a cute little equally-green doorknob on the last door separating the invaders from the bad men inside. Its placement is masterful, and its description genuinely creepy. One problem: Our grief-stricken man-with-a-mission Fezzik has no use for these inefficient things you call doorknobs.
  • At the end: he comes with four white horses he procured in case he ran into Inigo and Westley after they saved the lady ("Hello, Lady!") and explains it in a much more articulate way than his simple nature would allude to. As Inigo points out, Fezzik, you did something right. ("Don't worry, I won't let it go to my head.")

Vizzini

  • True to his word, he managed to determine exactly which goblet the iocane powder was in. His only mistake? The inconceivable notion that Westley would actually poison both drinks!
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