Epic film An epic film is a genre that emphasizes human drama on a grand scale Epics are more ambitious in scope than other film genres and their ambitious nature helps to differentiate them from similar genres such as the period piece or adventure film Epic historical films often take a historical or imagined event or a mythic legendary or heroic figure and add an extravagant spectacular setting and lavish costumes accompanied by a sweeping musical score and an ensemble cast of bankable stars making them among the most expensive of films to produce The Dark Knight Rises is nearly three hours long has an estimated budge of 250 M 100 M more than Batman Begins and 65 M more than The Dark Knight large action sequences and a popular actor or two sounds like an epic to me 138 162 140 52