The Princess Bride is a fairytale about a stunning woman named Buttercup and her true love Westley. Unfortunately, the path to true love is quite rough. In the beginning Buttercup takes Westley's love and affection for granted, so he runs away to the high seas and ends up being taken prisoner by the Dread Pirate Roberts. As a plea to Roberts for his life Westley tells him of his love for Buttercup. After hearing the impassioned story the pirate decides to let Westley live.

We soon find out that the real Dread Pirate Roberts hasn't been around for a long time and he did as each of his successors did and passed on the name for the chosen man to carry. As is tradition Westley is chosen to take over for the current Dread Pirate Roberts. This requires Westley to learn all the necessary skills, such as fencing and pillaging that are suitable to carrying the name of a famous pirate.

The evil prince is enchanted with the beautiful Buttercup, and proposes to her. His real plan, though, is to kill her and then accuse a neighboring country of the deed, thereby starting a war. For this reason, the evil prince has Buttercup abducted by his cronies before the wedding, while she ponders what happened to the man she really loves.

The henchmen, under the leadership of Vizzini (a self-proclaimed genius), transport Buttercup to the Guilder border. Once at sea they discover they are being trailed by a mysterious ship. Once they reach the shore they climb the steep cliffs to escape, but find themselves again being trailed by a mysterious stranger from the mystery ship with amazing strength and persistence.

As they arrive atop the bluffs, Vizzini asks the enormous Fezzik to smash him by throwing boulders down upon him. Since that does not succeed, Vizzini orders swordsman Inigo Montoya to ambush the unknown man and murder him. Montoya and the unknown man engage in a duel, with both of them being quite skilled at fencing. The two acknowledge how deeply they admire one another, and the unknown man triumphs, although he only knocks Inigo into unconsciousness instead of killing him.

When the stranger is still chasing Buttercup and her kidnappers, he runs into Vizzini, who gives him poison to drink. Luckily, the stranger has become immune to this kind of poison. When Vizzini dies, the stranger is by himself with Buttercup. The pair sets off on a journey, with Buttercup mocking the stranger for hiding his face and being generally inferior to Westley. Then, she finds out that the stranger is Westley himself.

The evil Prince Humperdick appears just as they are reuniting. At this point Buttercup is taken back to the palace in preparation for her marriage, while Westley is taken secretly down into the dungeon and severely tortured, until he is nearly dead. Thankfully, he is not completely destroyed by this torture, and is able to be revived by magic. Once this is done, he joins forces with Inigo and Fezzik, and heroically saves the Princess Bride from her evil fiance.