Epic Catastrophe

During the last few years, we watched the epic genre returning to hollywood.
After Gladiator, the sandal was back in fashion! But since then, we really never saw anything worty of attention. Troy was realy shallow and brief, Alexander was so dissapointing to viewers all over the world, and more recently, "The Kingdom of heaven",a movie in my opinion that failed to please the viewer, it seemed smt like an excuse for ridley scott to put battle scenes on the big screen.
Why in your opinion are the modern epics reason of failure?
My opinion...for kingdom of heaven is the editting. It was really tiring...you almost prayed that the film will finish.

Shhhhh. Maybe John won't notice. :o :D

John should delete our posts already. :D

Ouch! That hurts Eddie! Pull it out already! :.(

Tim, I don't take it like a man, but I do give it like a man. :o

Yes, Orlando Bloom does look completely out of his league. Again, it's all about the right actor with the right screen presence that makes an epic work.

And don't argue with me Eddie. Just sit there, be quiet and take it like a man. :p

Tim :D

john,

i agree with your assessment. notice how i didn't yearn for the good ol' days. :)

that being said, i like big epics, and i had no desire whatsoever to see "kingdom of heaven". orlando bloom just looks completely out of his league.

eddie

"It's not that epics aren't finding audiences...it's just that Hollywood isn't making good movies." --Eddie

There's certainly a point taken here. But I don't think Hollywood is making any more or any less bad films today than it did thirty or fifty or eighty years ago. It's just that as time passes, we tend only to remember the good films and forget the bad ones. In the present, though, until we can forget about them, we're stuck with having to deal with the bad films along with the good.

Anyway, I'm not sure the "epic" was so good in the "good old days," either. We remember "Ben-Hur" and "Spartacus" and "The Ten Commandments" as pretty good, sure; but how about "Demitrius and the Gladiator" or "The Greatest Show on Earth" or a hundred other duds.

My take on today's epics is that they mostly lack good characterization and strong actors. Say what you will, people like Charlton Heston and Kirk Douglas had screen presence and could hold an audience.

John

It's not that epics aren't finding audiences...it's just that Hollywood isn't making good movies.

The funny thing about it all is I don't even think "Gladiator" was all that great. It was OK for what it was but it was also a lot of unecessary, drug-out dialog that was trying too hard to mimic the epic films of yesteryear. It followed an average epic formula but the only reason I think the film did so well is because of Russell Crow. It's pretty much what made big epics of old days work. If you didn't have Charelton Heston or Kirk Douglas, then what was the point in making the film? Crow entered the entertainment scene with immediate, overnight popularity by the time he signed up to do "Gladiator". And let's face it, the guy is built for this kind of film. Brad Pitt? Are you kidding? No matter how hard Brad works out or hones his "bad guy" skills, he will still be recognized as a pretty boy. Same goes for Collin Farrel, granted I like his acting skills, but does he really fit into the "epic" part?

Just like Chubs from "Happy Gilmore" would say about golf, "It's all in the hips, it's all in the hips". I say, "It's all in the actors, it'a all in the actors". ;)

Tim :D