A Night at the Movies: The Gigantic World of Epics (2009)

December. 20,2009

| Documentary TV Movie

A Night at the Movies: The Gigantic World of Epics looks at Hollywood’s biggest screen spectaculars from all sides, including the genre’s beginnings, literary adaptations, great epic directors and actors, the challenges of making big-budget movies, classic set-pieces and epic music scores. The special also looks at how the genre fell out of favor with audiences and filmmakers in the ‘70s and ‘80s, only to be reborn with more recent films like Gladiator, and Dances with Wolves trilogy. Throughout, the special is packed with classic scenes and behind-the-scenes images from such films as The Birth of a Nation (1915), Gone With the Wind (1939), Samson & Delilah (1949), The Ten Commandments (1956), Ben-Hur (1959), El Cid (1961), King of Kings (1961), Lawrence of Arabia (1962) and Doctor Zhivago (1965).

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Cast

Robert Osborne as Self

[2021] Boulevard! A Hollywood Story [2018] Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story [2015] Tab Hunter Confidential [2010] Moguls & Movie Stars: A History of Hollywood [2008] Hollywood Singing and Dancing: A Musical History [2007] Private Screenings: Jane Fonda

Steven Spielberg as Self

[2021] I Am Alfred Hitchcock [2021] Indiana Jones: The Search for the Lost Golden Age [2019] Making Waves: The Art of Cinematic Sound [2019] The Movies [2019] The Movies [2019] Peter Falk Versus Columbo

Kenneth Branagh as Self

[2024] Tenet [2022] Death on the Nile [2022] Fireheart [2020] Looking at the World in a New Way: The Making of Tenet [2019] Lost Lives [2018] All Is True

Reviews

Solidrariol

2009/12/20

Am I Missing Something?

Fairaher

2009/12/21

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

Rio Hayward

2009/12/22

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

Billy Ollie

2009/12/23

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable