There are few things more glorious than awful politicians being shamed by the pop culture figures they love. Usually, it’s rock stars like Bruce Springsteen telling practically every Republican presidential hopeful to stop using his song “Born In The U.S.A.,” because that’s an easy thing for politicians to co-opt. Less easy, and less common is a politician co-opting a film’s spirit for the benefit of his image, but Ted Cruz has done just that.
The Republican Senator from Texas has been running around the country quoting The Princess Bride, which would be a pretty charming thing, if he weren’t so awful. Cruz doesn’t exclusively quote lines from Inigo Montoya — in the video below, you can see him do his amazing impression of Billy Crystal’s Miracle Max — but it’s Montoya himself (Mandy Patinkin) who is coming out against Cruz’s use of the film, specifically because Cruz is ignoring the true message of the film, and just using the bits and pieces he finds relevant to his hateful ways. This is a thing done by many folks on the religious right, you might’ve realized.
Talking to the New York Times, Patinkin elaborates:
“After the princess flies out the window and falls into Andre the Giant’s arms,” Mr. Patinkin said, “Inigo says to the Man in Black, ‘I have been in the revenge business so long, now that it’s over, I don’t know what to do with the rest of my life.’”
This is to say that Inigo Montoya realizes, in seeing the happiness love brings, that he’s wasted his life on revenge, and that’s the true message of his character’s journey. And what a nice message it is, not at all in line with Cruz’s plan to “carpet bomb” terrorists.
Watch a video of Cruz’s spot-on characters below: