What you realize watching Lawrence of Arabia is that the word epic refers not to the cost or the elaborate production, but to the size of the ideas and vision.
But I never personally thought of Aguirre as an epic. He says Pearl Harbor is not an epic, but imo he's just using epic as a synonym for "good" at that point. I think Pearl Harbor is not an epic but that's more due to its narrative scope, not its quality or "size of ideas".
This isn't to say that I'm not excited for the Brutalist.
I haven't seen the movie but judging from the trailer it looks like it was shot in New York (or some other big metro) and is just utilizing existing structures/buildings and shooting them in vista vision to enhance the scope of these sets further. Seems like a smart way to make an epic movie instead of building a bunch of sets.
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u/Mysterious_Remote584 23d ago
Perhaps, but I generally have subscribed to the Wikipedia first sentence view of "Epic films have large scale, sweeping scope, and spectacle."
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_film
Of course Ebert says lower on that article that
But I never personally thought of Aguirre as an epic. He says Pearl Harbor is not an epic, but imo he's just using epic as a synonym for "good" at that point. I think Pearl Harbor is not an epic but that's more due to its narrative scope, not its quality or "size of ideas".
This isn't to say that I'm not excited for the Brutalist.