# Top 5 Fantasy Films



## drumwvu (Feb 5, 2013)

If I had to rank my top five in fantasy films of all time the list would be the following:

1. Legend
2. Return of the King
3. Conan the Barbarin 
4. Labyrinth
5. The Wizard of Oz 

What are your picks?


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## CupofJoe (Feb 5, 2013)

In no real order... and probably not to everyone's definition of fantasy...
King Kong [1933] - The first and still the best...
Pan’s Labyrinth [2006] - Watched it twice and I'm still not sure I get it..
The Princess Bride [1987] - "Inconceivable" that the list could be without it...
Die Nibelungen [1924] - I just love this silent film [Hitler liked it too I learnt later]
Flash Gordon [1980] - "Gordon's alive?", pure pop-corn

But it could include Videodrome, Repo Man, Tetsuo, Delicatessen, Brazil, AmÃ©lie etc. depending on what you call fantasy…


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## MadMadys (Feb 5, 2013)

Mine are also in no order and I took a rather liberal view of "fantasy."

Bladerunner - My favorite scifi pick for many years.  The book is also a winner.
Conan the Barbarian - The movie score by Basil Poledouris is one of my personal favorites.
Ghost in the Shell - Not generally a big anime fan but with one is elevated above the rest in my mind.
Young Frankenstein - Not enough fantasy comedies.  Good fantasy comedies, I mean.
Jason and the Argonauts - Loved it as a kid and was probably one of those movies that first got me into using my imagination.

There are other movies that I wanted to include but either the list wasn't long enough or I felt bad calling some movies fantasy (Seven Samurai, The Hidden Fortress, most any other Kurosawa movie) by the general guidelines of "fantasy" in my mind.


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## drumwvu (Feb 5, 2013)

Granted those are some liberal views of fantasy, but good choices nonetheless.


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## SeverinR (Feb 5, 2013)

Which Conan? Arnold(1982) or the new one(2011)?
mine:
LOTR
LadyHawk
Excaliber
Princess Bride

Honorable mention: MP and the Holy Grail.


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## Anders Ã„mting (Feb 11, 2013)

So, what are the criteria here? Top five our own favourites? Top five in terms of general quality? Top five most influential?

I mean, Excalibur is a classic, no doubt about that. But, let's be honest, it's also pretty terrible.


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## Phietadix (Feb 11, 2013)

CupofJoe said:


> The Princess Bride [1987] - "Inconceivable" that the list could be without it...



You keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means.
Anyway . . .

My list is as follows, though not all of these would be considered fantasy by everyone.
1. LOTR
2. Princess Bride
3. Star Wars (I've heard it counts as Fatasy)
4. Flash Gorden (Mainly for the Music
5. Dark Crytal


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## Anders Ã„mting (Feb 11, 2013)

Alright, just going by my personal jugement now. Note, I don't count animated movies (I would need a whole separate list for that) nor do I include science fiction, but anything with magical elements are go:

1: *All LOTR movies:* If nothing else, they proved major high-quality fantasy movies are still possible.
2: *Conan the Barbarian 1980:* This movie really shouldn't be anywhere near as good as it is, but it is. Why? It's a mystery. 
3:* Highlander:* A rather strange and unusual concept, making for a very unique movie.
4: *The Princess Bride:* Find me a person who does not like this movie.
5: *Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade / Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl: *Shared fift place since I couldn't decide which one to pick. Both are close to perfect matinee adventures.

Runners up:

*6: All the Harry Potter movies: *All very good adaptions of the books. Probably on par with LOTR, even, but I wanted to get a few classics in there.
*7: Army of Darkness: *I _really_ wanted to put this in the top five because I like it so much, but it's really more of a guilty pleasure than a genuinely great movie. 
*8: The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe: *A very solid adaption of a classic book.
*9: Hook:* Always been a personal favourite. Maybe not as great as it was intended to be, but still a really fun ride.
*10: Stardust: *In my opinion a rather underrated movie, even better than the novel.
*11: The Mummy Returns: *Yes, the second one. I seriously think it's better than the first, and one of the most action-packed adventure movies I have ever seen.
*12: The Forbidden Kingdom:* Another underrated one. Basically the classic fish-out-of-water fantasy mixed with wuxia kung fu action. Has a surprisingly strong character arc.
*13: The Neverending Story: *Not nearly as good as the book, but still a noteworthy film.
*14: Willow: *Not amazing, but really not that bad either. Deserves a better reputation.
*15: Hellboy II: The Golden Army:* Guillermo del Toro needs to make more fantasy movies, because he has a sense of the odd and an original style that the genre for the most part is sorely lacking. The troll market alone made me glad I watched this movie. Footnote: While I agree Pan's Labyrinth is certainly a great movie as well, I don't think I'm the right guy to appreciate it. 

Then there are some I consider watchable and even pretty fun but not exactly _great_ (Dragonslayer, Excalibur, Nightbreed, etc) and some that I feel skirts the borders of what I consider to be fantasy. 

Though, this thread has reminded me there are some classic titles I still haven't seen, like Labyrinth and Ladyhawk. Going to have to do something about that.


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## Steerpike (Feb 11, 2013)

Phietadix said:


> 3. Star Wars (I've heard it counts as Fatasy)



Yeah. The real question is whether it also counts as Science Fiction. :tongue:


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## Zero Angel (Feb 11, 2013)

Steerpike said:


> Yeah. The real question is whether it also counts as Science Fiction. :tongue:



Even the people that say science fiction gets to have psionics, I'm sorry, I'm going to think of that as magic and call it fantasy.

ANYWAY, favorite fantasy movies, gosh that's tough. 

Snap judgement without real deliberation:

LotR
Escaflowne: the Movie (surprisingly good)
Legend
Stardust
Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children Complete​*Not an ordered set


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## Nebuchadnezzar (Feb 11, 2013)

Good thread.  Keeping the definition to movies that are sword and sorcery(ish), I'd say:

1. Conan the Barbarian (1980 Schwarzenegger version)
2. Fellowship of the Rings (Legolas skate-boarding on a shield ruined Two Towers for me and RotK was good but not a classic)
3. Dragonslayer -- just a wonderful movie that challenged a lot of genre conventions while delivering a great story and fantastic effects (for the time)
4. The Beastmaster -- Sorry.  Watched this dozens of times when I was growing up and still love it.  Dennis Miller once joked that HBO stood for, "Hey, Beastmaster's On!"
5. The Princess Bride/The Last Unicorn -- couldn't decide so called it a tie.


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## drumwvu (Feb 12, 2013)

There are some great picks in here. I was going for personal favorites. If we got into cinematography, directing, sound, etc. we could be here for a long time. I'll throw something fresh out here for consideration as well: my top five for fantasy films that I wish they would hurry up and make.

1. Elder Scrolls
2. Red Wall
3. Salvatore's Dark Elf
4. Dever's Lone Wolf
5. Weiss&Hickman's Hero of the Lance


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## Darkblade (Feb 12, 2013)

1) The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (They are pretty much one long movie divided into three so I'm counting them together)
2) The House of Flying Daggers
3) Princess Mononoke
4) The Princess Bride
5) Pan's Labyrinth


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## Zero Angel (Feb 12, 2013)

Darkblade said:


> 1) The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (They are pretty much one long movie divided into three so I'm counting them together)
> 2) The House of Flying Daggers
> 3) Princess Mononoke
> 4) The Princess Bride
> 5) Pan's Labyrinth



 How could I forget about Princess Mononoke?! Amazing film—although the ending was a let-down in my opinion.


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## psychotick (Feb 12, 2013)

Hi,

For me its as follows:

LOTR - always. (And the Hobbit!).
Highlander - But the sequals are some of the worst films ever made.
Willow - It's just bloody awesome.
Stardust - how can you go past De Niro in a dress as a sky pirate ship captain!
The Beastmaster - Damn those animals are cute!

Cheers, Greg.


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## Anders Ã„mting (Feb 16, 2013)

Zero Angel said:


> How could I forget about Princess Mononoke?! Amazing film—although the ending was a let-down in my opinion.



Lies. Princess Mononoke is perfection.

Like I said, I would need a second list only for animated stuff, and half of it would consist of Hayao Miyazaki anime.


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## Steerpike (Feb 16, 2013)

I liked Princess Monoke. I also thought Spirited Away and Kiki's Delivery Service were excellent.


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## Bonesaw (Feb 17, 2013)

Have to consider The Neverending Story. Really affected me as a kid. Original and groundbreaking.

Agree with Legend...


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## Zero Angel (Feb 17, 2013)

Anders Ã„mting said:


> Lies. Princess Mononoke is perfection.
> 
> Like I said, I would need a second list only for animated stuff, and half of it would consist of Hayao Miyazaki anime.



I thought it felt forced and additionally it left me dissatisfied. 



Spoiler: Princess Mononoke



You were really happy with the everyone lives happily ever after?



You could always make a top ten list and try to compare live action with animated films. I mean, I appreciate needing an additional 5 slots, but making an entire 'nother list avoids ranking them with each other.

@Everyone: Has anyone seen Tales of Earthsea or Secret World of Arietty? How's his son measuring up? Miyazaki-sama co-wrote Arietty I read.


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## James Lecky (Feb 18, 2013)

There are a few recent(ish) films that fall under the broad definition of fantasy/ sword and sorcery that I enjoyed to varying degrees
Season of the Witch, with Nicholas Cage and Ron Perlman - silly but good fun with a proper s&s feel to it.
Iron Clad, with James Purefoy, no real fantasy element as such, but fairly gorefilled with some decent action scenes
Black Death, Sean Bean - like Iron Clad it's pretty much on the cusp, but does feature witchcraft and, of course, Sean Bean being stoic and heroic.
Solomon Kane, again with James Purefoy - not great (low budget but with big ambitions) but not utterly awful either, and James Purefoy does a decent enough job of playing Kane - not one for the REH purists though.

And that's my tuppence worth


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## Steerpike (Feb 18, 2013)

I liked Solomon Kane. I thought it was an enjoyable film.


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## James Lecky (Feb 19, 2013)

I rather enjoyed Solomon Kane, too, despite a few misgivings. James Purefoy was well cast and there were some good action scenes - it strayed quite a bit from Robert E. Howard's original, but then again, there are things in Howard's work that would be less than acceptable to modern audiences.


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## Steerpike (Feb 19, 2013)

James Lecky said:


> I rather enjoyed Solomon Kane, too, despite a few misgivings. James Purefoy was well cast and there were some good action scenes - it strayed quite a bit from Robert E. Howard's original, but then again, there are things in Howard's work that would be less than acceptable to modern audiences.



Yes, exactly. It wasn't perfect, and it departed from the lore, but on the whole I thought it was good. As opposed to the most recent Conan, which I thought was good at the start, when Conan was a boy, and went downhill from there (despite the fact that I thought the actor cast was just fine in the role).


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## Anders Ã„mting (Feb 21, 2013)

So I recently saw Ladyhawke and Labyrinth.

I can't say I liked Ladyhawke much. I mean, it's watchable, but the soundtrack was kinda inappropriate, the special effects were laughable even by 1985 standards, Matthew Broderick's acting was _atrocious,_ Michelle Pfeiffer did her best but her character had no personality, and I could barely hear Rutger Hauer over the constant rubbery creaking of his leather outfit. I did enjoy the random Alfred Molina appearance. The rest of the movie was kinda forgettable, though.

On the other hand, Labyrinth was really good. I kinda wish I'd seen it as a kid, because it seems like the sort of movie that would have really influenced my younger self.



Zero Angel said:


> I thought it felt forced and additionally it left me dissatisfied.
> 
> 
> 
> ...





Spoiler: Hell Yes



I'm _always _happy with the everyone lives happily ever after.





Steerpike said:


> I liked Solomon Kane. I thought it was an enjoyable film.



I just kinda kept thinking: "There is _no way _this takes place 16th century England. No way." I really tried to enjoy it, but when the villain started _crucifying _people, my suspension of disbelief was crucified along with them.


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