*Dances With Wolves
The Last of the Mohicans
Forrest Gump*
… I’ll probably think of more as soon as I hit ‘submit’
Forest Gump is an EPIC? Let’s remember folks, I’m looking for visually stunning films. Not just “good flicks”.
Some movies are just too bad to whether they’re epics or not: things like Planet of the Apes (the new version), Pearl Harbor, and Independence Day. I don’t want to offend anyone by saying the Star Wars movies are in this category, so I won’t. 
HPL:
Don’t think so, but I already have it.
NDP: Thanks for the 2001 idea. I’d also love to get Blade Runner.
I have been looking for Ran for some time. and I’ll snap it up if I find it. Likewise Schindler’s List if it’s ever released on DVD.
I’ve even realized that there’s a few I already have that I hadn’t thought of as epics:
*AI: Artificial Intelligence
Empire of the Sun
Full Metal Jacket
The Great Escape
The Magnificent Seven
Rob Roy
Silverado
We Were Soldiers
Wind Talkers
*
Legends of the Fall - Melodramatic, but decent.
The Great Escape - What can I say? One of my all-time favorites.
For visually stunning films, how about The Adventures of Baron Munchausen? It may not actually have a cast of thousands, but it seems like it in a few places. An extraordinarily charming and imaginative movie. Maybe not technically an “epic,” I guess, but then it’s no Independence Day, either. If you’d consider AI an epic, maybe you’d go for this one too.
The Right Stuff
Not a cast-of-thousands film, but I think it qualifies on the visuals and the scope of the story.
[sub]Obscure reference: “That’s the hero, Joe Thousands”[/sub]
Giant (Goddammit, they better bring this to DVD soon)
Citizen Kane (What could be more epic than the life of Charles Foster Kane?)
Forrest Gump is most definitely an epic, in just about every sense of the word. I would think that’s pretty obvious, if you know what an epic story is.
Even if you’re just talking about an epic movie in the sense of grand, sweeping cinematography, Forrest Gump qualifies. Some images from the movie that immediately come to mind:
Forrest and his company walking down the dirt road in Vietnam, just before they are attacked.
Forrest and Jenny finding each other in the mirror pool in D.C. at the protest rally. Thousands of onlookers cheer them on. Famous scenic landmarks in the background.
Forrest on his shrimp boat, silhouetted against a majestic sunset.
Forrest running from coast to coast back and forth. Many great scenes here, but especially the desert scenes in Monument Valley in Utah.
It really is a beautifully filmed, epic movie.
…Fellowship of the Rings, the Two Towers, and, after next year, the Return of the King, of course… 
well… since someone montioned Battleship Potemkin I think I should throw Alexander Nevsky out for your consideration…
Morally repugnant but cinematically brilliant: Birth of a Nation
Someone beat me to The Right Stuff. But certainly epic in scope and visuals.
How about:
Kagemusha (although it feels a little truncated)
Mountains Of The Moon
The Mission
The Leopard
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire (if Gladiator counts, this should too)
Is Paris Burning?
A Passage To India
Barabbas
The 47 Ronin Pts. 1 & 2
The Four Feathers (1939 version)
Quo Vadis (the first two versions: 1912, 1951)
Some personal suggestions for consideration:
The Blues Brothers
The Lone Wolf And Cub series (especially the later films)
The Three & Four Musketeers films directed by Richard Lester.
I don’t think El Cid has been mentioned. (1962 or so.)
A recent Chinese film called The Emperor and the Assassin, about the first Emperor of China (who brought all the separate kingdoms under the domain of Xin). I think it ranks with Kurosawa.
Gettysburg; I’m looking forward to Gods and Generals.
Sunshine
It’s the story of three generations of a Jewish family in Hungary, told against the backdrop of the changing political scene. It starts under the Austro-Hungarian empire in the late 19th century, continues through the WWII era, and ends under the communist regime arond 1970 or so.
Ralph Finnes plays three roles in series - father, son, and grandson.
Cabiria (1914)
Storm Over Asia (1928)
Cimarron (1931)
A Tale of Two Cities (1935)
San Francisco (1936)
The Good Earth (1937)
Lost Horizon (1937)
In Old Chicago (1937)
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939)
Ivan the Terrible, Part One (1945)
The Robe (1953)
A Farewell to Arms (1957)
King of Kings (1961)
Mutiny on the Bounty (1962)
All available on home video.
Man, someone just HAS to mention Les Miserables with Liam Neeson. Thats an amazing movie, set over many years. The locales are amazing to behold.
What about Willow? Or perhaps the Indiana Jones movies? Or, hmm, maybe Gandhi?
Nah. I nominate Monkeybone as a truly wonderful epic movie…
I can’t believe nobody’s mentioned Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. This movie lacked a little in epic battles in the thousands but it did have about a hundred in the desert skirmish. But the backdrop and music alone made this movie epic.
The french film Germinal, based on the Zola book.
It was a film of epic proportions, cinematographically brilliant - it’s a dark, dark film, without the “epic battle” component of your definition, but has all the makings of the epic film otherwise - from the huge cast of thousands, to the brilliant photography and artistic direction…
It was anything BUT an art film, which many associate with french cinematography. Worth seeing, if you haven’t already. Along the same lines, Indochine, another epic french film, is one which qualifies in all those catetories.
So there you go, the francophone’s contribution to the Epic Film Thread…
E.
The Mad Max series.
Quit laughing at me.