Why Do Fantasy Films Suck?
OK, I will concede that not all fantasy films do, in fact, suck. The Lord of the Rings trilogy provide an outstanding exception to the general suckitude of fantasy film, as do Excalibur and... Willow? Is that really the best I can do for a top three? Now that I think about it, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe is a much better film than Willow (and more true to its source material than LotR). Labyrinth might make the top three on many lists, and even Legend, a film most notable for Tim Curry having a devil of a time, might be picked by a few.
Let me state right now that I am using a fairly narrow definition of "fantasy." I'm really talking about sword and sorcery films, stories about wizards and monsters and knights in armor. With a broader definition, we could include films like Pan's Labyrinth, Bridge to Terabithia, the Harry Potter films, and a slate of modern treatments of fantastic fiction. Excellent films like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero are also not considered here, as they are (at heart) a very different kind of fantasy. No, at the moment I'm having a longing for flashing blades, thundering horses, and eldritch spells. And I don't have the attention span for Dungeons and Dragons.
Now, there are films of this genre that are fun, but are not really good. Willow fits more comfortably here, as does Conan the Barbarian, The Scorpion King, and a few others. Films that get it almost, but not quite, right. Films that satisfy in the same way that late-night junk food does: it tastes not-too-bad and it fills the belly, but it's not what one is really hungry for.
Still, even including the honorable mentions and the guilty pleasures (I'm looking at you, Beastmaster), the good (or at least good enough) sword and sorcery films are far outnumbered by the crap. For every Fellowship of the Ring, there are five like Krull, or The Warrior and the Sorceress. Why should that be, though? In the last decade, special effects have advanced to the point where no magical effect is beyond the film-maker. Even before that, fantastic things could be done with relatively simple techniques -- Excalibur worked wonders with fog machines and fancy lighting, and Labyrinth proved the possibilities of puppetry and make-up effects.
It has been argued that the genre has been played out. I disagree with this, and direct the curious to George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series for my favorite recent example (which is due to be an HBO miniseries, I hear). Even if that were true, and no new works of good sword and sorcery were being written, there is still a wealth of older works which could be adapted to film. Ignoring for a moment the films which were bad-to-insulting adaptations of their source material (I refuse to acknowledge the existence of any Earthsea movie, for example), the whole second wave of weird fantasy is largely untapped. I'm talking about things like Michael Moorcock's Elric saga (though I hear that someone is working on it), Poul Anderson's The Broken Sword, and a body of work by Roger Zelazny too long to list here. It's not a lack of material.
No, I'm afraid that it's fundamentally a lack of respect. I am not trying to make any kind of argument that fantasy, much less swords and sorcery, deserve some kind of special respect because of their mythic themes or whatever. All I'm saying is that there is no excuse for bad storytelling, for having enough respect for the material one is working with to do the research and make a decent film. The basics of film-craft aside, solid plot, good characterization, and world-building apply to most any film not set in the here-and-now of the intended audience (and a bunch of those, too). One might argue that this is especially true of a film that asks the audience to make suspensions of disbelief from the first frame.
This is one of the first mistakes of the hack fantasy film. The assumption is that, if we accept that there's magic, we'll buy anything. It seems that once magic comes in, logic goes out. No matter how obvious the plot hole or screwy the logic, the director just assumes that the viewers will accept it as magic. If anything, the opposite is true. Once real-world experience is no longer a guide as to what to expect, the film has to have a consistent internal logic to explain it, or the story falls apart.
Another mistake made is introducing fantastic elements without context. The director assumes that everyone who comes to see the fantasy film will already know what elves are, and so drops "Bob the Elf" into the story without any explanation as to why he has pointed ears, or what elves are, or why Bob is different than the human characters. The hero has a magic sword. Why is it magic? Who made it, and for what purpose? "Who cares?" the director says, "Fantasy films have magic swords, so the sword is magical."
A related issue is the inclusion of fantastic elements that serve no purpose. How many times has a wizard -- especially an evil wizard -- used flashy magic to do something that would be simpler or more effective done by hand? Consider item #34 on the Evil Overlord List: I will not turn into a snake. It never helps. For some unknown reason, the hero has fancy, elaborate weaponry totally inappropriate to his culture or environment. Again, Bob the Elf is included, just because fantasy has to have elves. One might argue that the Dungeons and Dragons movies are textbook examples, where some of the most cliched elements of the role-playing game are included for no story related reason, just to make it painfully clear that the film is based on D&D.
The audience's suspension of disbelief is a precious gift, film makers. Don't waste it on crap.
I am more than willing to take suggestions for what y'all think are good sword and sorcery films, and even argument that films I've described in less-than-glowing terms deserve better. Talk to me, people.
Let me state right now that I am using a fairly narrow definition of "fantasy." I'm really talking about sword and sorcery films, stories about wizards and monsters and knights in armor. With a broader definition, we could include films like Pan's Labyrinth, Bridge to Terabithia, the Harry Potter films, and a slate of modern treatments of fantastic fiction. Excellent films like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero are also not considered here, as they are (at heart) a very different kind of fantasy. No, at the moment I'm having a longing for flashing blades, thundering horses, and eldritch spells. And I don't have the attention span for Dungeons and Dragons.
Now, there are films of this genre that are fun, but are not really good. Willow fits more comfortably here, as does Conan the Barbarian, The Scorpion King, and a few others. Films that get it almost, but not quite, right. Films that satisfy in the same way that late-night junk food does: it tastes not-too-bad and it fills the belly, but it's not what one is really hungry for.
Still, even including the honorable mentions and the guilty pleasures (I'm looking at you, Beastmaster), the good (or at least good enough) sword and sorcery films are far outnumbered by the crap. For every Fellowship of the Ring, there are five like Krull, or The Warrior and the Sorceress. Why should that be, though? In the last decade, special effects have advanced to the point where no magical effect is beyond the film-maker. Even before that, fantastic things could be done with relatively simple techniques -- Excalibur worked wonders with fog machines and fancy lighting, and Labyrinth proved the possibilities of puppetry and make-up effects.
It has been argued that the genre has been played out. I disagree with this, and direct the curious to George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series for my favorite recent example (which is due to be an HBO miniseries, I hear). Even if that were true, and no new works of good sword and sorcery were being written, there is still a wealth of older works which could be adapted to film. Ignoring for a moment the films which were bad-to-insulting adaptations of their source material (I refuse to acknowledge the existence of any Earthsea movie, for example), the whole second wave of weird fantasy is largely untapped. I'm talking about things like Michael Moorcock's Elric saga (though I hear that someone is working on it), Poul Anderson's The Broken Sword, and a body of work by Roger Zelazny too long to list here. It's not a lack of material.
No, I'm afraid that it's fundamentally a lack of respect. I am not trying to make any kind of argument that fantasy, much less swords and sorcery, deserve some kind of special respect because of their mythic themes or whatever. All I'm saying is that there is no excuse for bad storytelling, for having enough respect for the material one is working with to do the research and make a decent film. The basics of film-craft aside, solid plot, good characterization, and world-building apply to most any film not set in the here-and-now of the intended audience (and a bunch of those, too). One might argue that this is especially true of a film that asks the audience to make suspensions of disbelief from the first frame.
This is one of the first mistakes of the hack fantasy film. The assumption is that, if we accept that there's magic, we'll buy anything. It seems that once magic comes in, logic goes out. No matter how obvious the plot hole or screwy the logic, the director just assumes that the viewers will accept it as magic. If anything, the opposite is true. Once real-world experience is no longer a guide as to what to expect, the film has to have a consistent internal logic to explain it, or the story falls apart.
Another mistake made is introducing fantastic elements without context. The director assumes that everyone who comes to see the fantasy film will already know what elves are, and so drops "Bob the Elf" into the story without any explanation as to why he has pointed ears, or what elves are, or why Bob is different than the human characters. The hero has a magic sword. Why is it magic? Who made it, and for what purpose? "Who cares?" the director says, "Fantasy films have magic swords, so the sword is magical."
A related issue is the inclusion of fantastic elements that serve no purpose. How many times has a wizard -- especially an evil wizard -- used flashy magic to do something that would be simpler or more effective done by hand? Consider item #34 on the Evil Overlord List: I will not turn into a snake. It never helps. For some unknown reason, the hero has fancy, elaborate weaponry totally inappropriate to his culture or environment. Again, Bob the Elf is included, just because fantasy has to have elves. One might argue that the Dungeons and Dragons movies are textbook examples, where some of the most cliched elements of the role-playing game are included for no story related reason, just to make it painfully clear that the film is based on D&D.
The audience's suspension of disbelief is a precious gift, film makers. Don't waste it on crap.
I am more than willing to take suggestions for what y'all think are good sword and sorcery films, and even argument that films I've described in less-than-glowing terms deserve better. Talk to me, people.