Satire or Parody | The Princess Bride and Robin Hood: Men in Tights

The Princess Bride and Robin Hood: Men in Tights
Satire or Parody?

The Princess Bride and Robin Hood: Men in Tights both share the same actor as their main characters, Cary Elwes. A man, who is much past his prime in tight-wearing opportunities. Besides this, both movies give you the same sort of feeling when you watch them, amusement mixed with a tad bit of awkwardness. The movies however, released 5 years apart from each other, do not fall under the same genre of comedy. The Princess Bride and Robin Hood: Men in Tights are a satire and parody respectively.

The definition of a parody is, “an imitation of the style of a particular writer, artist, or genre with deliberate exaggeration for comic effect.” And although throughout most Robin Hood: Men in Tights I was making awkward, uncomfortable groaning noises, it is just that. Robin Hood: Men in Tights is a parody of all former Robin Hood movies and books, evident by the title. The very, very, very dry and uncomfortable jokes and comments throughout the film referencing previous Robin Hood movies solidify this claim.

In the movie, Robin Hood, directly references previous Robin Hood books and movies. He makes a mockery of previous Robin Hood movies based on the classic English folk hero, with the words,

“Because, unlike some other Robin Hoods, I can speak with an English accent.”

Another example is the scene in which the main characters reference they are filming a movie, like when Robin Hood and other members of the cast pulled out their scripts during the archery scene. I believe this acted as way to ridicule previous Robin Hood movies for what I can only imagine is, as I have not seen any other Robin Hood movies, as a way to show how ridiculous these movies on how everything always works out for Robin Hood in the end. 

I originally presumed Prince John’s iconic mole that danced across the screen was for just chuckles and giggles, but through research I actually discovered was used to make run of a previous character with a mole from the movie, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves.  Other mannerism throughout the movie, such as King Richard’s Scottish accent, was also used as a way to poke fun at the King in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. Now, although I don’t have a lot to go off as this is the first Robin Hood movie I have seen, other internet sources do show that Robin Hood: Men in Tights uses scenes form other Robin Hood movies to poke fun at them such as the banquet scene where Robin Hood brought in a pig and then argued with the King over taxes which was copied over from Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. Other scenes in this movie also ridicule the supposed time period this movie is based in, perhaps making fun of the extremity of things or how the culture was inappropriately adapted for previous Robin Hood movies, such as the over exaggeration of Marian’s chastity belt.

Moving onto the Princess Bride, The Princess Bride is a satirical movie. Satire is the “use of humour, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people’s stupidity or vices” or essentially, mockery. Satire can also translate into irony, which was displayed throughout Princess Bride very heavily. One example is when Vizzini, who believed he was so much smarter than Westley, challenged him to a battle of wits and was then killed by his own poison he intended to kill Westley with. Another example was when Buttercup pushed Wesley down the hill, thinking he is Pirate Roberts when he is actually, her true love. Satire is also used with Vizzini as he is short but smart, while Fezzik, who is big and strong, is ‘dumb’. The entire fight scene between Wesley and Inigo Montoya can also be seen as satire:

Examples are,

   a) When Inigo waited patiently for Westley to climb up the cliff, even though he intended to kill him

   b) When Westley and Inigo both used their non-dominant hand when the duel began

If you were to summarize The Princess Bride, you would realize how satirical and ironic the entire thing is:

“Princess Buttercup looses her true love, and then is kidnapped by a mercenary and his henchmen, then rescued by a pirate, then forced to marry a Prince, and then rescued by the henchmen who (tried) to capture her in the first place.”

I have labeled The Princess Bride as satirical because I couldn’t find a direct connection in which this movie made fun of previous princess-prince love stories. I honestly felt it was a well-crafted movie that played a unique spin on the typical damsel in distress movie, and the writers of the movie created a script with much of the humour being satirical that was very enjoyable to watch. With Robin Hood: Men in Tights, although the element of satire is there as it closely relates to parody, we are able to link a distinct connection between Robin Hood: Men in Tights and previous Robin Hood movies.

Works Cited

"Robin Hood Men in Tights: The Swashbuckling Spoof." Movies Nerdiness and More. N.p., 01 Dec. 2011. Web. 10 May 2015. <https://moviesnerdinessandmore.wordpress.com/2011/12/01/robin-hood-men-in-tights-the-swashbuckling-spoof/>.

"Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves." IMDb. IMDb.com, n.d. Web. 10 May 2015. <http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102798/>.