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As You Wish discussion
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Just put in a hold on the ebook at my library. I'm next in line!
Started my re-read yesterday. This book just makes me smile.Edited to add: looks like my name is going to look the same as our moderator, so to clarify, I’m a long time lurker, hoping to be more active now. I might see if I can change how my name appears so there’s no confusion.
I'll be picking up my copy from the library on Tuesday. Excited to start! I wanted to start with the group when you were reading Hidden Figures, but life was too crazy. Glad to be starting now!
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I re-watched the movie this weekend. It’s been awhile, but every time I see it, I think, “no wonder everyone loves this movie.” I’ve checked out the audiobook from my library and will be listening to it as I walk to work and back this week. It’s narrated by Cary Elwes with guest appearances by almost all the surviving cast members. I’m really looking forward to it!
I will VERY happily re-read this book. It's basically a love letter to the movie, and such a pleasure to read, especially given all the ugliness coming out of the industry right now.
Princess bride is my favorite movie and this has been on my reading list for a long time. Mom got me the book awhile ago. I’m starting my read today.
For anyone else in Canada, the Kindle edition is just $2 for us right now, too. Looking forward to this - it looks like fun!
I’m super excited that this was the choice, too. I can’t wait for the discussion to start!
My IRL book club read it and watched the movie last year - it was fun! I will look forward to hearing the thoughts of everyone here!
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So I'll start out saying that I did really enjoy reading it. I love The Princess Bride, and it was great finding more about the making of it and what it was like on set. I liked all the anecdotes about cast interactions and things like that. It really made me want to go back and watch the movie again.
That being said, I'm not really sure what else to talk about. It does make me want to look into more about Andre the Giant. He was described as being so kind, even in the face of people being afraid of him. I did a quick google, I don't think he every really wrote anything about his experience before he passed. It made me wonder if he was really so calm and accepting of people's reactions to him, or he just learned he had to be, because at his size getting angry about it would just make things worse? Or was it really just such a part of his life it no longer bothered him?
What did anyone else think?
I just finished listening to the audiobook. It’s so wonderful hearing everyone having such a positive experience of one of my favorite movies. And Cary’s voice is so friendly and sexy.There are some points where there’s a lot of repetition (especially about how wonderful Andre is), which I think was a critique when the book came out. Since I was listening to it, it sounded more like just a regular conversation to me.
My only real moment of, “Wait! That’s not right!” was when Cary said that Mandy played Che Guevara. The character is named Che but isn’t Che Guevara. Minor detail, but I can’t believe it got through.
It's still $1.99 on Kindle, I just purchased it. I have one book to read before I start it. Hopefully I'll start in a couple days.
I finished it last night. It was DEE-lightful. I loved the stories about Andre the Giant and Billy Crystal cracking everyone up during his scenes. I plan on rewatching the movie when I get off work today to catch some of the things mentioned in the book.
This pick was fun because it made me revisit The Princess Bride. I'd seen the movie growing up, but didn't love it. Before starting the book I watched the movie again (for the first time as an adult) and I really enjoyed the movie! Much, much more than I had when I was younger. However, the book was a miss for me. I struggled through 70 pages and then gave up. I didn't have any nostalgia towards the movie, so I didn't really care about how it was made. I found Cary's text too repetitive. He was surprised he got the role and nervous they were going to fire him, the director and producer were great, all of the cast members were great.... I get it. Move on. That said, I didn't realize the audiobook had a lot of the cast as part of the narration. Maybe I'll give that a try. On the bright side, I have a new feel-good movie to add to my rotation!
I enjoyed the book. It was a very sweet memoir of making the movie. I liked the stories from the set. It was a fun read about one of my favorite movies that was easy to get through at the end of a long day.But I didn't love it. I agree with Sara that it was a bit repetitive. And while it was refreshing that there were nothing but positive stories, it almost felt like a PR release and it never really hooked me.
That said, I do look forward to watching the movie again knowing a few new behind-the-scenes stories.
I liked this as a “more behind the scenes about my favorite movie” and not necessarily a great or well written book. My favorite quote in the whole book came from Billy Crystal and not Cary. But it so summed up my family and The Princess Bride. My parents saw it in the original theater release and loved it. It was my family’s “oh you’re home sick from school? Cuddle in blankets and watch this” movie. I watched it multiple times while in labor. “It’s like a great old hat that you can pass down that somebody of the next generation can wear and it still fits, ya know? That’s what it is. Also, you can sit there with a little one next to you and you don’t have to worry about putting your hands over his eyes because there’s something scary or your hands over their ears because they shouldn’t hear something. Everything’s done with a charm.” And that is just it. That’s what that movie was to me. It’s an old hat that fits. From my parents, to me, and someday to my kiddo.
I can see people's complaints about it being repetitive, but I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Princess Bride has been among my favorite movies for a long time and it was interesting to read the behind the scenes. I was pleasantly surprised by the little notes from others in the cast and crew in addition to Cary's thoughts. I learned things I didn't know. I honestly did not know that the ROUS's were people in costumes, I had assumed they were puppets. Finding out that Cary was literally knocked out coming out of the fire swamp was kind of funny. And I enjoyed the chapter about learning the swordfight immensely. But, that may be because my youngest son is into fencing so I have learned a little about it in general.
Thanks for getting me to read this book. I love the movie but when I first saw the book I felt kind of meh about it. I don't read a lot of non-fiction in general, other than memoirs by female comedians it seems like.
I just finish reading As You Wish. It took me a little longer not because I didn't enjoy it, but because it was my at work lunch read. It's really an easy read though and even though I'm not super familiar with the movie I still enjoyed it. A little background on me I never saw the movie until my late teens, my sister asked for it for Christmas and she loved it, while I hated it. The second time I watched it was with my husband and I fell asleep. Some parts of the movie stuck with me and I gave it another go. The third time is the charm I guess because now I love it. However, I wasn't terribly thrilled about reading As You Wish, but quickly found myself really enjoying it. I liked the casual language and the little tidbits thrown in by the other people who took part in making the movie. Now I've got to watch the movie again, maybe tomorrow on my day off.
The Princess Bride is my all time favorite movie. I was one of the people he talks about who first saw it when it came out on video (when I was a teen) and my mom and I fell in love immediately. This was my second time reading As You Wish. I bought the book as soon as it came out and then my husband took me to the As You Wish tour to see Cary Elwes in person. It was truly amazing for me. I personally loved the book, it was simple and filled with delightful stories. I can understand some of the criticisms mentioned here, but for me they are easy enough to overlook. I think that writing this book was a labor of love for Cary and all the cast that contributed and that showed through any repetition or weak writing.My favorite parts of the book were the stuff about Billy Crystal as Miracle Max and the stories about Andre the Giant. My uncle was a HuGE wrestling fan in the 80s. He got the chance to spend a day (along with a group of other fans) with Andre which ended with front row seats to one of his wrestling matches. To this day, my uncle will SWEAR that nothing he saw was faked. But the thing that impressed my uncle most was how kind and gentle Andre was. He said that he was very hard to understand at first, but after several hours, they got used to his accent and had good conversations. He also said that Andre was clearly very intelligent and wanted to talk about things other than wrestling, which made some of the fans unhappy. So having heard these stories growing up, I had no trouble believing the stories about Andre in the book. In fact, I loved getting background on Andre’s life and it makes me want to read more about him.
The truth is I love pretty much the whole book, it’s like reminiscing with an old friend. Just like I could watch the movie over and over, I could read this book over and over.
Just finished the audio book of this and I found it really enjoyable. It's light and funny and cute, although if you're not someone very familiar with the move then I could see it being a bit boring/repetitive. I liked the stories about all the cast members, especially about Bill Goldman and his antics on set. The audiobook has the extra bonus of being read by the author and most of the other people who contribute to the book, which I really liked as well. Anyway, now I'm off to go re-watch the movie...
For kindle readers in America, it's $2 on Amazon right now, for those interested.
Here's the topic for the discussion, when people are ready!