Beginners Guide to Epic Fantasy

 

Bran is a young man content with this life in a sleep village, cut off from the rest of Buresia. One night a stranger comes and forces Bran to leave the village and travel Buresia to defeat a dark force. With him travel a band of mismatch companions, who were forced together by chance, but eventually become strong friends. While on the quest Bran discover he has a unique gift that means he is the only one who can stop the dark force, who he faces at the climax of the film.

The plot of an epic fantasy is essentially a coming of age story. There are wise mentors to lead the protagonist down the right path, as well as friends to help him through the difficult trials and a love interest to fight for. As the story develops the characters will rapidly mature and see the clear differences between good and evil. It is a story that has stood the test of time in literature, but only recently started to be seen on the big screen. This is because achieving the great depth and scale of these stories on film has only just been possible.

Epic fantasies are set in parallel worlds that have their own geography, religions and history, and the techniques to fully capture this have only been around in the last 25 years. Due to the improvement in CGI as well as international travel, plus the larger budgets, directors can successfully create the grand scale that comes with an epic fantasy. So now all the beauty and richness that is described on the page, sine most epic fantasies were originally books, can be brought to life on screen.

In the past epic fantasies have been saddled with the stereotypes of overacting leads, big bosomed women and low budgets, which means that film studios have avoided financing many projects. However, since the huge success of Lord Of The Rings and Harry Potter, people in Hollywood have seen how epic fantasies can become mega buck franchises due to the hard-core fans that support them. Unfortunately even after the success of some franchises the old stigmas still exist so epic fantasies are found more often on the bookshelf rather than with the DVDs.

 

Films you must see

TheNeverEnding Story (1984)

Labyrinth (1986)

The Lord Of The Ring Trilogy (2001-2003)

The Harry Potter Series (2001-2011)

The Chronicels of Narnia  (2005-present)

Stardust (2007)

Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole (2010)