With the success of Gladiator, both critics and scholars enthusiastically announced the return of a genre which had lain dormant for thirty years. However, this

Explores the return of the 'epic' in twenty-first-century cinema. With the success of Gladiator, both critics and scholars enthusiastically announced the return

Soon after film came into existence, the term epic was used to describe productions that were lengthy, spectacular, live with action, and often filmed in exotic

With the recent release of spectacular blockbuster films from Gladiator to The Lord of the Rings trilogy, the epic has once again become a major form in contemp

In this volume, David Lean's now undervalued epics--The Bridge on the River Kwai, Lawrence of Arabia, Doctor Zhivago, Ryan's Daughter, and A Passage to India--a