FANTASY FILMS

Terry Gilliam's Imaginative Fantasies:

The Adventures of Baron Munchausen - 1988A so-called imaginative fantasy trilogy of the inimitable Terry Gilliam's films include: (1) the British, Monty-Pythonesque, profitable time-warp film Time Bandits (1981) about a time-traveling boy and six renegade dwarves passing through various historical time periods, (2) his nightmarish Brazil (1985) about a fantasizing civil servant in a future totalitarian and bureaucratic state, and (3) his expensive and elaborate effort - the unique, visually-rich and witty fantasy film The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988) - about a notorious, tall story-telling, baron and his adventures with a headless 'king of the moon' (Robin Williams), a naked Botticelli's Venus (Uma Thurman), the god of the volcanoes Vulcan (Oliver Reed), and other fantastic characters. Another Terry Gilliam fantasy focusing on imagination and reality, though not part of the trilogy, was the bittersweet and enigmatic The Fisher King (1991) about two lost souls -- a disillusioned shock-jock radio DJ (Jeff Bridges) and a half-insane homeless ex-stock broker (Robin Williams) -- who are both searching for spiritual redemption and questing for the Holy Grail.

Fantasy Adventures - Journeys in Time:

Journey to the Center of the Earth - 1959One of the most popular fantasy films of all time was director Henry Levin's adaptation of Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth (1959) - a journey into the earth's core to prehistoric, underground lost worlds through a volcano by a scientist (James Mason). Another Verne book was also adapted for Disney's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954) with seaman Kirk Douglas captured by Captain Nemo (James Mason) and his Nautilus submarine. Its most memorable scene was the battle against a giant squid.

George Pal's version of H.G. Wells' The Time Machine (1960) has already been mentioned as an excellent example of a time-travel adventure. [The remake of the Victorian novelist's book, an adventure-fantasy The Time Machine (2002), was directed by Simon Wells, the author's great grand-son.] Fantastic Voyage (1966) told the adventure/sci-fi tale of a group of shrunken scientists journeying through a patient's body. Malcolm McDowell traveled forward in time as H.G. Wells himself - in pursuit of Jack the Ripper in the thriller Time After Time (1979). The romantically-sentimental fantasy Somewhere in Time (1980) showcased a brief romance crossing many decades (triggered by the key phrase "Come back to me") between Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour. Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989) portrayed two dudes (Alex Winter as William S. Preston and Keanu Reeves as Theodore Logan) who traveled through time to pass their history class test. Their stupidity was demonstrated when they were offered the Iron Maiden by their medieval Evil Duke captor - they reacted with "Excellent!" without realizing that it was a torture execution machine and not a rock band. Another appealing time-travel story without special effects was Peggy Sue Got Married (1986) - 42 year-old lead character Peggy Sue (Kathleen Turner) time-traveled to her teenaged years after passing out at her 25th high school reunion.

Sci-Fi Fantasies of Lucas and Spielberg:

The highly successful Star Wars (1977) and its sequels in the trilogy were a tribute to 1940s swashbuckler serials, with additional special effects, exotic space creatures and spacecraft. Fantastic, but friendly aliens or extra-terrestrials were the subjects of Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) and E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982).

Recent Medieval Fantasy Films as Adventure, Sword and Sorcery Swashbucklers in the 80s and 90s:

Due to the fast popularity of Dungeons and Dragons games, many 80s fantasy films followed suit by combining adventure swashbucklers with typical fairy tales - as in the following:

Fantasy Films with Angels:

Angels, not surprisingly, have been featured in many fantasy or supernatural films over the years. Hollywood has responded to the interest in the existence of heavenly beings with a long list of 'angel' films. In the past and recently, the most popular ones have been:

Comic-Strip or Comic-Book Heroes Appearing in Fantasy - Action Films:

Comic strip super-heroes, from 40s and 50s comic books and other sources have also been the subjects of numerous fantasy (and action hero/heroine) films, almost too many to mention fully. These superheroes are repeatedly chosen to be the subjects of big-budget blockbuster films, with glossy production values, expensive special effects, make-up and costuming, and a simplistic plot line involving the superhero's struggle against a villainous arch-nemesis. The difficulty with listing films related to comic-book heroes is that there are so many varieties: live-action, animated and other original or adapted combinations:

Batman (the Dark Knight or the Caped Crusader) - based on DC Comics' Batman created by Bob Kane
From 1989-2008: There were six Batman films with four different actors in the title role
  • Batman Returns - 1992director Tim Burton's two versions, both starring Michael Keaton as the title character:
    • Batman (1989), a noirish, darker blockbuster epic film featuring Jack Nicholson as the Joker and Kim Basinger as Vicki Vale
    • a more action-packed, gothic, and visually-stunning Batman Returns (1992) with Danny DeVito as the Penguin and Michelle Pfeiffer as the Catwoman
  • director Joel Schumacher's lighter Batman Forever (1995) with Val Kilmer as the hero and Chris O'Donnell as his sidekick, and a number of memorable villains, including Jim Carrey as the Riddler, Tommy Lee Jones as Harvey "Two-Face" Dent, and Nicole Kidman as the love interest Dr. Chase Meridian
  • Joel Schumacher's stylized sequel Batman and Robin (1997) with George Clooney as the hero with Alicia Silverstone as Batgirl, Arnold Schwarzenegger as Mr. Freeze and Uma Thurman as Poison Ivy
  • director Christopher Nolan's dark Batman Begins (2005) (aka Batman 5), concentrating on the origins of the Batman saga/legend, with the hero (Christian Bale), Wayne's training mentor Henri Ducard (Liam Neeson), trusted family butler Alfred (Michael Caine), Gotham City detective Lt. James Gordon (Gary Oldman), the leader of the quasi-terrorist League of Shadows group Ra’s Al Ghul (Ken Watanabe) and secondary villain Dr. Jonathan Crane/Scarecrow (Cillian Murphy), cohort and Wayne Enterprises' chief inventor and head of R&D Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman), and childhood friend and young assistant DA (Katie Holmes)
  • Nolan's sequel The Dark Knight (2008), with Christian Bale reprising his role as Bruce Wayne/Batman, and deceased co-star Heath Ledger as the villainous bank robber named the Joker (who tragically died shortly after the film's shoot)

  • also, the campy Batman (1966), with Adam West as Gotham City's caped crusader Bruce Wayne and Burt Ward as the Boy Wonder Robin
  • the adult-oriented, animated Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993), based upon the popular 1990s animated TV series, with voices provided by Kevin Conroy (Batman/Bruce Wayne), Dana Delany (Andrea Beaumont), and the Joker (Mark Hamill)
  • the critically-assailed film Catwoman (2004), with little relation to the previous DC Comic character portrayed by Michelle Pfeiffer in Batman Returns (1992), with Halle Berry as the whip-cracking, evil-fighting feline character adept in the Brazilian martial art of capoeira
Flash Gordon
  • director Mike Hodges' British remake of the original, a campy and cartoonish Flash Gordon (1980), a reprise of the adventurous, sci-fiction/fantasy Flash Gordon serials of the late 1930s with Sam Jones as the heroic space warrior fighting Ming the Merciless (Max von Sydow)
Superman (The Man of Steel) - based upon the DC Comics' Superman created by Joe Shuster and Jerry Siegel

From 1978-1987: There were four Superman films with Christopher Reeve in the lead role

  • director Richard Donner's blockbuster Superman: The Movie (1978), with Christopher Reeve as the superhero Man of Steel (and alter-ego Clark Kent), in love with fellow reporter Lois Lane (Margo Kidder), who could be weakened by greenish Kryptonite, and was opposed to the villainy of Lex Luthor (Gene Hackman)
  • director Richard Lester's great sequel, Superman II (1980), again with Christopher Reeve, Gene Hackman, and Margo Kidder, featuring Superman's struggle against three evil Kryptonians (one of whom was Terence Stamp as the diabolical Zod)

  • Two other inferior sequels:

    • Superman III (1983), also directed by Richard Lester, with Christopher Reeve
    • Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987) - directed by Sidney J. Furie and featuring Christopher Reeve's fourth and final appearance as the hero

  • director Bryan Singer's Superman Returns (2006), the fifth film in the series since 1978; starring newcomer Brandon Routh as the Man of Steel, and Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor, Kate Bosworth as Lois Lane, Frank Langella as Perry White and Eva Marie Saint as Martha Kent; the film would be an unusual sequel in that it took place after the events of Superman II (1980), and pretended the events of the dismal next two sequels never took place. It stressed its place in the series by the following: it made numerous references to the first two films; it used the exact same opening credits style (zooming CGI titles of the same font type); it utilized John Williams' famous fanfare and score; it featured the same ending (Superman flying above the Earth at dawn and smiling at the camera before flying offscreen); and it even used Marlon Brando to play Jor-El posthumously, splicing clips from the first film into the film using CGI. In the plot, Superman - after returning to Earth after five years in space - found that Lois Lane was a single mother and Lex Luthor was still causing trouble. It was the world's first live-action Hollywood feature with selected sequences (about 20 minutes) converted from 2D to IMAX 3D.

  • also, the disastrous flop Supergirl (1984), with Helen Slater as the cousin of Superman
Spider-Man (Spidey) - based upon Marvel Comics' Spider-Man created by artist/writer Stan Lee and Steve Ditko
  • director Sam Raimi's record-breaking blockbuster Spider-Man (2002), derived from the original source material (and from 52 episodes in the 1967-1970 Saturday morning cartoon series on ABC); it told of the adventures of college student Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire), alias super-human Spider-Man, fighting his nemesis the Green Goblin (Willem Dafoe); the highest-grossing superhero film of all time
  • Raimi's sequel Spider-Man 2 (2004) - two years into the future featuring a new villain: Dr. Otto Octavius/Doctor Octopus (Alfred Molina) with four mechanical tentacles
  • Spider-Man 3 (2007), the third film in the series since 2002, again from director Sam Raimi, with Thomas Haden Church as the villainous morphing Flint Marko (aka Sandman), and Topher Grace as Venom; although not as popular with the critics, it became the second highest-grossing superhero film behind The Dark Knight (2008)
Other Major SuperHeroes
  • director Bryan Singer's X-Men (2000) - based on peace-keeping characters including Magneto, Storm (Halle Berry), Sabretooth, Toad, Cyclops, and Mystique in the Marvel Comics series created by Jack Kirby and Stan Lee
    • the inevitable (and superior) sequel was Bryan Singer's X2: X-Men United (2003)
    • another sequel followed by director Brett Ratner, X-Men: The Last Stand (2006) (originally titled X3)

  • director Tim Story's Fantastic Four (2005), about a group of four super-powered astronauts (due to cosmic radiation exposure) who oppose enemy Doctor Victor Von Doom (Julian McMahon); the four include: Reed Richards (Ioan Gruffudd) - a stretchable and rubbery Mr. Fantastic, Sue Storm (Jessica Alba) - the Invisible Woman; Johnny Storm (Chris Evans) - the Human Torch; and Ben Grimm (Michael Chiklis) - the rock-hard The Thing
More Animated or Comic-Book Related SuperHeroes
  • Roger Vadim's futuristic Barbarella (1968), with Jane Fonda as the Queen of the Galaxy comic-strip heroine
  • director Mario Bava's Danger Diabolik (1968), based upon the Italian comic Diabolik, created by Angela and Luciana Giussani; with John Phillip Law (as a super-criminal) and Marisa Mell
  • TV's Wonder Woman (1974) with tennis star Cathy Lee Crosby, and TV's The New, Original Wonder Woman (1975-77) with Lynda Carter, in satin tights; from the original DC Comics strip by Charles Moulton from the late 1940s
  • The Incredible Hulk (1977), aka the green Hulk, another Marvel Comics figure created by Jack Kirby and Stan Lee; personified by Bill Bixby (and Lou Ferrigno)
    • remade as director Ang Lee's visually-striking and creative live-action The Hulk (2003) with a beastly CGI-creature (originally Dr. Bruce Banner (Eric Bana))
  • director Robert Altman's box-office failing musical Popeye (1980), based on E. C. Segar's comic strip of the same name; with Robin Williams as the squinty-eyed, pipe-smoking sailor title character with muscular arms, and Shelley Duvall as stick-thin Olive Oyl
  • director Katsuhiro Otomo's Akira (1988), based upon the director's anime comic Akira, first published by Kodansha
  • director Sam Raimi's comic-book style action-horror film Darkman (1990), with Liam Neeson as vengeful burn victim scientist Peyton Westlake/Darkman
  • co-writer/director/star and producer Warren Beatty's stylish Dick Tracy (1990) - featuring cartoonist Chester Gould's Gotham City detective Dick Tracy (portrayed by yell0w-garbed Warren Beatty)
    • Dick Tracy was originally a serial, beginning with Dick Tracy (1937) and Dick Tracy Returns (1938) starring Ralph Byrd
  • Jim Henson's sewer-dwelling, crime-fighting Turtle characters Leonardo, Donatello, Raphael, and Michelangelo in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Movie (1990), directed by Steven Barron
    • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze (1991), directed by Michael Pressman
    • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III (1993), directed by Stuart Gillard, set in 17th century Japan
    • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2007), a CGI-animated film that was a sequel to the live-action film series - it took place after the second film in 1991 and pretended the events of the third film never occurred
  • The Rocketeer (1991) - about a top-secret jetpack (sought by Nazi spies) that propelled a young 1930s stunt flyer into being a super-hero
  • director Albert Pyun's Captain America (1992), with Matt Salinger as Steve Rogers/Captain America - a superhuman warrior
  • the comic-book styled fantasy comedy Mask (1994), with Jim Carrey as geeky banker Stanley Ipkiss - transformed into a frenetic and zany Tex Avery-like superhuman by a magical mask; over a decade later, an awful sequel was released, Son of the Mask (2005) with Jamie Kennedy
  • the commercially-oriented movie Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers: The Movie (1995) - derived from the kids TV series about Power Rangers
  • the adapted, cultish midnight film Tank Girl (1995) - the underground British comic-book punk heroine
  • the fantasy adventure/horror film Spawn (1997), featuring the debut of the dark character created by comic book artist (and executive producer) Todd McFarlane - the vengeful, super-powered anti-hero from Hell named Spawn (Michael Jai White)
    • followed by the animated sequels Spawn 2 (1998) and Spawn 3: The Ultimate Battle (1999)
  • director Stephen Norrington's violent and superb hit film Blade (1998), based upon Marvel Comics' Blade, created by Marv Wolfman artist Gene Colan, starring Wesley Snipes as the black leather-clad, super-human vampire hunter with kung fu skills opposed by the half-breed, arch-nemesis vampire Deacon Frost (Stephen Dorff)
    • the first sequel: Mexican director Guillermo del Toro's bloody sequel Blade II (2002) with expensive special effects, and featuring Wesley Snipes reprising his popular role
    • another sequel: director David S. Goyer's Blade III (2004) (aka Blade: Trinity)
  • director Kinka Usher's debut film and offbeat comic spoof Mystery Men (1999), based upon Bob Burden's Flaming Carrot Comics, now published by Image Comics; starring Ben Stiller (as Mr. Furious), William H. Macy (as Shoveler), Hank Azaria (as the Blue Raja), Geoffrey Rush (as the villainous Casanova Frankenstein) - and more
  • the original comedy biopic American Splendor (2003) from directors/screenwriters Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini, with Paul Giamatti as Harvey Pekar, a real-life comic book writer; the screenplay was based on Pekar's comic book series American Splendor, which he had been writing since 1976 on Dark Horse Comics, and the 1994 book-length comic Our Cancer Year co-authored with soulmate Joyce Barber (Hope Davis)
  • director Mark Steven Johnson's sci-fi action thriller Daredevil (2003), with Ben Affleck as lawyer-by-day Matthew Murdock - a blind (but sense-enhanced) crime-fighting masked super-her0 at night, based upon the popular Marvel Comics' character; also with the appearance of Jennifer Garner (TV's Alias star) as female assassin Elektra Natchios - a spin-off character
    • director Rob Bowman's martial-arts ninja comic-book action film spinoff flop Elektra (2005), starring Jennifer Garner as the Greek title character assassin (derived from the equally disastrous Daredevil (2003))
  • director Guillermo del Toro's Hellboy (2004), based on Mike Mignola's Hellboy published by Dark Horse Comics and the miniseries The Seed of Destruction; starring Ron Perlman (as the monstrous horned creature from Hades), Selma Blair, and John Hurt
  • director/screenwriter Brad Bird's ingenious blockbusting and Oscar-winning Best Animated Feature, The Incredibles (2004), the sixth collaboration between Disney and Pixar, was about paunchy Bob "Mr. Incredible" Parr (voice of Craig T. Nelson), an ex-do-good Superhero suffering a mid-life crisis and living under-cover in suburbia, with his restless wife Helen (voice of Holly Hunter) - former rubber-limbed masked vigilante Elastigirl, and their superhero children; the family was lured back into super-herodom against the evil Syndrome (voice of Jason Lee)
  • director Jonathan Hensleigh's The Punisher (2004), an action-based comic-book superhero film, based on a Marvel Comics character first introduced in 1974 - a frontier-style vengeful vigilante in modern-day urban America; first filmed in Australia in 1989 in a straight-to-video release by director Mark Goldblatt
  • director Robert Rodriguez' Sin City (2005), adapted from Frank Miller's Eisner Award-winning comic series of graphic, noir-like stories, beginning in the early 90s with Sin City
  • director James McTeigue's V for Vendetta (2006), based on the comic book series of Alan Moore (illustrated by David Lloyd), and produced/screenwritten by the Wachowski brothers; the story was set in the dystopian future in the UK; the first episodes of V for Vendetta were originally published in black-and-white between 1982 and 1985, in Warrior, a British anthology comic published by Quality Comics, and then reprinted and continued after 1988 by DC Comics

Other Comic-Book SuperHeroes On-Screen

  • Nick Fury: Agent of Shield (2006) - a made-for-TV pilot, starring David Hasselhoff as Stan Lee's James Bond-like secret agent
  • Ghost Rider (2007) - A stuntman motorcycler-turned supernatural superhero (anti-hero), named Johnny Blaze (Nicolas Cage)
  • Green Hornet (2010) - starring Seth Rogen as the Green Hornet and Stephen Chow as his sidekick Kato; based on the 1930s radio serial show and comic book series about the adventures of the masked crime-fighting super hero and billionaire vigilante (Britt Reid, aka Green Hornet) and his martial arts sidekick, Kato. [It was also a mid-60s TV series with Van Williams as the Green Hornet and Bruce Lee as his martial-arts sidekick, Kato.] The characters were created by Fran Striker and George Trendle, the same team who created The Lone Ranger and his faithful sidekick Tonto
  • The First Avenger: Captain America (2011) - another film with the WWII super-patriot soldier Steve Rogers

Modern Fantasies:

The Mask - 1994Tom Hanks starred as a thirteen year-old boy who suddenly had the body of an adult in director Penny Marshall's comic fantasy Big (1988). Tim Burton's imaginative and poignant Edward Scissorshands (1990) was about a young man (Johnny Depp) with metal, scissor-like hands. And the fantasy comedy The Mask (1994) starred Jim Carrey as a hyperactive, green-skinned superhero whenever he donned a magical mask (produced by Industrial Light and Magic's CGI effects) - similar to the antics of cartoon characters created by Tex Avery in the golden age of animation. [A sequel from Lawrence Guterman, who directed the acclaimed visual effects hit with taking animals, Cats & Dogs (2001), was titled Son of the Mask (2004), with comic star Jamie Kennedy.]

The Franchise Films of Harry Potter, The Lord of the Rings, and The Chronicles of Narnia:

Peter Jackson's successful fantasy adventure-epic about witches and wizards - The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) - the first of three films - was derived from J.R.R. Tolkien's tale of Middle Earth with Hobbits, dwarves, and elves, and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001) - also the first of a series of films - was taken from J.K. Rowling's imaginative world of wizards. Both blockbuster fantasy films appeared at the same time and competed each year against each other in new releases year after year.

Following close on their heels was Buena Vista's The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005), derived from a series of seven fantasy novels for children written by C.S. Lewis in the early 1950s. It told about four Pevensie children, Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy, who journeyed through a magical wardrobe into the land of Narnia where they met the great lion god/messiah Aslan and took part in breaking the evil White Witch Jadis' strangehold power.

The Harry Potter Series
The Lord of the Rings Series
The Chronicles of Narnia Series
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001) The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005)
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002) The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002) The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (2008)
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004) The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010)
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005) The Hobbit (2011)  
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007) The Hobbit 2 (2012)  
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009)    
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 (2010)    
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 (2011)    
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