Top 10 Fantasy Films (not including animated films)

Note: Exempting It's a Wonderful Life for obvious purposes.

Hon. Mention: Stardust

A rousing piece of lighthearted adventure fantasy in the vein of The Princess Bride. It's not as good as that film, but it's a personal favourite of mine. Charlie Cox and Claire Danes making for an extremely endearing lead duo of a young lovelorn man and a 'fallen star', respectively, whom the man first chains up to take back to his village crush but soon ends up falling for. Along the way there's some incredibly fun setpieces and characters, including a surprisingly loveable Robert de Niro as one very campy pirate, Michelle Pfieffer as one of the most heinous but funny witches imaginable, and a bunch of ragtag, murderously deceitful knights. It's just a fun film that's worth a family watch. 

10. Mary Poppins

Featuring many a classic childhood song like 'Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious', 'Chim-Chimeney' and 'Let's Go Fly a Kite', iconic real-life cum animation sequences which were incredibly innovative for their time and still are, a delightful Julie Andrews in the lead role. Everyone in the cast gives it their all, especially Dick van Dyke and while I must admit his Cockney accent is shockingly bad, everything else he does in the role is so filled with unbridled enthusiasm and joy, it's easy enough to forgive him for it. It may not be anything like the source material it was based on apparently, but it's still a great Disney film, one of the very best that's a sheer joy to watch over and over.

9. The Seventh Seal

Filled with great performances, this is nevertheless very much a director's film. And with Ingrid Bergman at the helm I guess you really couldn't fare better, as you are presented with such a darkly comical world, with a wry edge to each line of dialogue, that merges perfectly with the surreal yet oddly realist, if that makes any sense, imagery. It's a great film that moves along splendidly while getting into quite deep complex philisophical areas.

8. Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

A joy to watch especially for anyone who's a fan of Disney, Looney Tunes, cartoons in general, you've got them all in the package and the new scintillating additions of Jessica Rabbit, Baby Herman, and of course Roger Rabbit himself. The title is fairly self-explanatory, it involves Bob Hoskin's Eddie Valiant trying to find out who set up Roger for the murder of his studio boss. The blend of good-natured family comedy, the darker edge of Valiant's hardboiled detective work, and the more adult elements like Jessica Rabbit's innuendos, somehow all fit perfectly. Acting-wise Christopher Lloyd is probably the highlight for me as the ridiculously EVIL Judge Doom, but Hoskins is fantastic as our lead into the story, as I said all the cartoon characters are great, but the real MVP here is of course Roger Zemeckis, who refines his detective splendour to the extreme with his flawless balancing of comedy and wonder here.

7. Ugetsu

A hauntingly beautiful example of 1950's Japanese cinema, this tale of two peasant couples whose respective husbands aspire for success in business, and the grandeur of samurai life, is a sublime example of how the intimate and low-key qualities of small-town life and mentalities can be made into something so eloquently felt. Each frame of Kenji Mizoguchi's film carries a sense of mystique to it, and I won't spoil too much but it builds up its spiritual aspect into a breathtaking conclusion. In fact, aside from Ikiru and High and Low by the great Akira Kurosawa, it might just have the most powerful ending in all Japanese cinema. Which is really saying something.

6. Big Fish

One of Tim Burton's best films, Big Fish is a tale about tall tales that's about Edward Bloom, a former Southern traveling salesman, is played by both Albert Finney and Ewan McGregor at two stages of his life, as an extreme romantic with a relentless vigour for life. The film mostly consists of him telling his story through flashbacks to his son, played by Billy Crudup. As per usual for Burton there's lots of wacky characters and stylistic choices along with a great deal of heart. Big Fish is one film I recommend to people that don't necessarily like Tim Burton films, as it's really just a great romantic love story, alongside being a moving exploration of fatherly love as Edward tells his story to his son (played by Billy Crudup).

5. The Princess Bride

Well here's how you do 'Once Upon a Time' to perfection. Framed with a lovely grandfather-son relationship, it's the tale of a boy and girl and their love story which spirals from humble farmland beginnings, to increasingly high and crazy stakes. It's an extremely entertaining film that works firstly because the couple at the centre of it, a very young Cary Elwes and Robin Wright, make their romance so winning that we wish to see them get their happy ending. Along the way we have some marvellously hateful villains in the form of Chris Sarandon and Christopher Guest (yes, he of Spinal Tap fame), and a beloved trio of miscreants in the form of Wallace Shawn's Vizzini who can't quite pinpoint what 'inconceivable' means, the lovable gentle giant Fezznik played by Andre the Giant, and of course Inigo Montoya who is splendidly performed by Mandy Pantikin. Add in a few great cameos, a fascinating blend of fantastical imagery and ironic humour, and you have a great film. 

4. Pan's Labrinyth

As Roger Ebert himself put it, '"Pan's Labyrinth" is one of the greatest of all fantasy films, even though it is anchored so firmly in the reality of war.'. In fact I'll link the whole article here: http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-pans-labyrinth-2006. Anyway, this is a great example of how to make the whole fantasy/reality divide work with just the right amount of both magical fantacism, and ambiguity. Set against the backdrop of the Spanish Civil War, a young girl Ofelia (Ivana Baquero) finds respite from the terrible world surrounding her in a mystical world of a labryniths, gardens and strange creatures, some terrifying (the Pale Eyed man is the stuff of nightmares ramped up to eleven), some endearing (the faeries). It's a beautifully shot film with great sets and music, and the ending is particularly powerful as it both celebrates youthful defiance but also packs quite the tragic punch.

3. Beasts of the Southern Wild

A fantasy drama that's both realistically grounded in reality, and yet at other points mystically transports you into this otherworldly place that's both within the world created by the film, coupled with that directorial touch of Benh Zetlin which makes it just...words cannot really describe why this film makes one feel the way it does. It centres on the journey, both outwardly and inwardly, of young Hushpuppy (played wonderfully by Quvenzhané Wallis) into adulthood as she deals with all manner of incidents befalling her tight-knit bayou community: melting icecaps, an ailing father, government interference and the imminent threat of the titular beasts.

That's the plot but if I'm to be frank the film isn't really driven at all by it, which I loved: despite all of the oddities and fantastical elements, the fact that it maintains the tonality of a 'slice of life' feature film is pretty darn impressive. A lot of this is helped of course by Wallis who does the almost unthinkable for a child actor which is to act as the anchor of the film: rather than just some cutesy fodder or unrealistically sage 'man-child', she carries the film wonderfully with her very naturalistic performance. Equally impressive though is Dwight Henry as her father Wink: representing the coarser but yet no less admirable qualities of humanity through his craggy, blunt, intense and yet ultimately very moving performance. I thoroughly loved every moment Henry's characterization brought him full circle from the man who in the past had loved and lost, to the 'tough-love' father who beset by illness maintains a defiant, defensive stance.

The cinematography and script of this film are in their own ways highly minimalistic, there's of course that very precise sense of style to the fantasy elements, but what the film does so well is in making them all seamlessly merge together in what I consider the closest film, alongside The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, to verge on true poetic cinema.

Joint 1st: Edward Scissorhands, The Lord of the Rings trilogy

Tim Burton's masterpiece, and one of my all-time favourite trilogies (in fact, the perfect trilogy), are joint first on my list, and both are pretty popular films I'm sure most people have either seen/heard about, so I won't go into too much detail about the films as a whole. I will say that though I think the Lord of the Rings films are almost unmatched in their production and directorial excellence, I think I prefer Edward Scissorhands ever so slightly, for very personal reasons.

Edward Scissorhands

Just the physical comedy of this scene alone, would make the film worth watching. Depp's physical approach in this performance is very Buster Keaton-esque in the best possible way. He's able to elicit laughs through just the smallest movement.

Just a nice little moment of the townsfolk being nice.

It's in sequences like these where Burton really lets loose with his style...

...and moments like these where he truly soars (one of the film's greatest moments).

Just one of the many little small moments Burton inserts here and there to make the film's message resonate even more with the audience.

Heartbreaking, pt. 1.

EVEN MORE HEARTBREAKING

Fellowship of the Ring

The forming of the Fellowship is a great scene just in terms of character set-up, and also McKellen's performance is too often taken for granted, just look at his little reactions in this scene...

...when compared with the sheer intensity he gives to the scene here. This is why he's one of my favourite actors; he brings so much different strokes of brilliance to each of his performances.

Probably one of the best death scenes of all-time, McKellen might give the MVP performance of the film but Boromir's demise is heartwrenchingly portrayed by Sean Bean. 'I would have followed you, my brother... my captain... my king.'

The Two Towers

Bernard Hill's perfromance as Theoden should've gotten some awards contention at the very least. The amount of emotion the script and he instill into this one scene is tremendous. 

'Andy Serkis isn't being nominated for an Oscar in this scene'. Cinemasins reference aside, isn't his work in The Two Towers sublime? He makes Gollum every bit as slimy and pathetic an individual as he should be but also manages to convey Smeagol's desire to redeem himself. A great performance.

Helm's Deep, and the attack of the Ents, are just great action sequences, and that's all I have to say, really. So much detail is given to each sequence and you can pick something new out every time you re-watch them.

A foreshadowing of how great Sean Astin would be in the third installment as this speech perfectly encapsulates what makes the bravery of our Lord of the Rings characters so compelling.

Return of the King

Elves have just got to have fun, and this is an example of how the medium of film can add onto the source material of novels through cool sequences like this. Also to whoever criticizes Orlando Bloom as an actor, I see your drift, he was awful in say Troy and to an extent the Pirates films, but he is pretty much the perfect Legolas, and I like the little dynamic he strikes up with John Rhys-Davies in the films. 

A brilliant subversion of the Macbeth trope to be sure, but also just a really rousing scene. 

Iconic moment for sure, and for a reason; Sean Astin's performance in this film is arguably the best of the whole series. 

Aragorn's arc throughout the whole series is perfectly capsulated in these two moments. He always had the greatness to be one, he just needed an opportunity to shine. And shine he does in taking the charge against the Black Gate. 

All's well ends well, and it's incredibly powerful to see the Hobbits, smallest of all beings, being rightfully honoured for their bravery and valour against the odds.