# Epic movies **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 15, 2003, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943 "2003-06-15T01:58:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![El\_Elvis\_Rojo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@El\_Elvis\_Rojo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/El_Elvis_Rojo)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/1 "2003-06-15T01:58:53Z")
So, a coworker and I were trying to put together a list of epic films the other day, and I was wondering if we could get some help on the matter. Personally, when I think “Epic”, I tend to think of those older films where, not only the scenes were huge, but you had extra casts of hundreds, sometimes thousands. And they were generally about three hours long or so. So far, we’ve got a short list, but here goes: Sparticus Ben Hur Cleopatra Lawrence of Arabia were the really big classical epics we could think of, and some of the more modern ones were: Gladiator The Lord of the Rings (both films) I’m sure we’ve missed a lot, so who else knows of some great ones? ---
**Author:** ![samarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4da419/32.png) [@samarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samarm)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/2 "2003-06-15T02:12:29Z")
Check out this previous thread for lots of epic movies: [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=160359&highlight=epic+movies](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=160359&highlight=epic+movies) 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![samarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4da419/32.png) [@samarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samarm)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/3 "2003-06-15T02:19:16Z")
Sorry, on review the above looks like a smart ass reply. I’ll give you 2 of my picks to start with: Deer Hunter Saving Private Ryan ---
**Author:** ![lno](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a8b319/32.png) [@lno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lno)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/4 "2003-06-15T02:35:40Z")
I wouldn’t call Deer Hunter an epic in the sense of Spartacus, Ben-Hur, Lawrence of Arabia, et cetera. Yes, it’s three hours long, but it doesn’t have that cast of thousands. It seems more insular and centered on a small cast over a relatively short period of time. I just saw _Giant_ this past week, though, and I’d nominate that. Three hours, twenty-one minutes, three generations of characters, huge sweeping vistas; it screams ‘epic’ to me. ---
**Author:** ![samarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4da419/32.png) [@samarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samarm)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/5 "2003-06-15T02:38:52Z")
Nearly a third of Deer Hunter is all about the wedding. There are hundreds of extras involved in those scenes. Also there are many extras in the Nam sequences. ---
**Author:** ![lno](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a8b319/32.png) [@lno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lno)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/6 "2003-06-15T02:51:09Z")
Wow, how’d I forget the wedding? Still, I’m loathe to include it. We might as well call The Godfather an epic for similar reasons. (Of course, some people probably do so.) ---
**Author:** ![samarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4da419/32.png) [@samarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samarm)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/7 "2003-06-15T02:58:23Z")
Hey, the wedding scenes are almost a movie all by itself! OK, we’ll leave Deer Hunter on the “maybe” list for now. How about: Planet of the Apes (original) btw, I _would_ also call The Godfather an epic… ---
**Author:** ![detop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bcef8e/32.png) [@detop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/detop)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/8 "2003-06-15T04:04:10Z")
How about _The Longest Day_, _A Bridge Too Far_, _The Ten Commandments_, _Braveheart_, _Zulu_, _The Alamo_, _The Right Stuff_ (OK, I’ll quit for now). ---
**Author:** ![butter\_pie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/aca169/32.png) [@butter\_pie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/butter_pie)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/9 "2003-06-15T05:29:10Z")
It’s a little more obscure than the movies named, but after reading the OP, this is what immediately popped to mind (I saw it in a theatre about two and a half years ago:) [http://us.imdb.com/Title?0145503](http://us.imdb.com/Title?0145503) I liked it, though it ended up being a little depressing and I was fairly tired, so had trouble staying awake in some parts. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 5:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/10 "2003-06-15T05:50:47Z")
Cabiria (1914) The Birth of a Nation (1915) Intolerance (1916) Civilization (1916) Orphans of the Storm (1921) The Ten Commandments (1922) The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923) Ben-Hur (1925) Metropolis (1927) The King of Kings (1927) Napoleon (1927) Noah’s Ark (1929) All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) Cimarron (1931) A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1935) A Tale of Two Cities (1935) Mutiny on the Bounty (1935) The Charge of the Light Brigade (1936) San Francisco (1936) The Good Earth (1937) In Old Chicago (1937) Lost Horizon (1937) Marie Antoinette (1938) The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939) ---
**Author:** ![HPL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3da27b/32.png) [@HPL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HPL)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/11 "2003-06-15T06:07:08Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by lno \* > \*\*Wow, how’d I forget the wedding? > > Still, I’m loathe to include it. We might as well call The Godfather an epic for similar reasons. (Of course, some people probably do so.) \*\* Well, Actually it has been called an Epic by others. More with the muti-generational thing across 80 years then anything else. It’s also had enough impact that apparently real life mobsters were using stuff from the movies that didn’t exist beforehand. ---
**Author:** ![Skijumper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3e96dc/32.png) [@Skijumper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skijumper)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/12 "2003-06-15T06:22:10Z")
For some reason, the word ‘epic’ , to me, always conjures up images of sand. Lots and lots of dust and sand. My picks - **Gandhi The English Patient Dances with Wolves** and Terry Gilliam’s **The Adventures of Baron Munchausen** - a comedy epic? ---
**Author:** ![CyberPundit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/76d3ee/32.png) [@CyberPundit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CyberPundit)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 6:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/13 "2003-06-15T06:24:05Z")
Though most people don’t think of animated films as epics I would definitely count **Princess Mononoke** as a great epic film. Also Lean’s two other large-scale films: **Dr Zhivago** and **Bridge on the River Kwai** **El Cid** though I remember it only vaguely. Kurosawa’s **Ran** (haven’t seen it yet) Though it doesn’t have any war scenes **Gandhi** definitely qualifies as an epic. ---
**Author:** ![lilbtagna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4491bb/32.png) [@lilbtagna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lilbtagna)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/14 "2003-06-15T15:26:24Z")
What about **The Seven Samurai** and **Gone with the Wind**? [aside] **CyberPundit** , I just saw _Ran_ a couple weekends ago and absolutely loved it. It’s definitely an epic movie that you should check out as soon as you have the chance to.[/aside] ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/15 "2003-06-15T17:22:39Z")
_How the West Was Won_ was definitely an epic (I’m talking about the 1962 movie, not the latter TV series). ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/16 "2003-06-15T18:46:26Z")
Robin Hood (1922) The Iron Horse (1924) The Thief of Bagdad (1924) Die Nibelungen: Siegfried (1924) Die Nibelungen: Kriemhild’s Revenge (1924) Wings (1927) Hell’s Angels (1930) Things to Come (1936) Alexander Nevsky (1938) The Wizard of Oz (1939) The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1943) Henry V (1944) Ivan the Terrible, Part I (1945) Duel in the Sun (1946) Ivan the Terrible, Part II (1958) ---
**Author:** ![samarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4da419/32.png) [@samarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samarm)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/17 "2003-06-15T19:25:36Z")
Wow, Walloon, you’ve seen all these movies? Where would you rent these from? ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2003, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/epic-movies/181943/18 "2003-06-15T19:40:39Z")
I’ve seen all but _Civilization_ and _Robin Hood_. All are available on home video. You can rent most of them on DVD from [NetFlix](http://www.netflix.com).