It would take a film historian to evaluate the dozens—hundreds?—of times Hollywood has marshaled casts of thousands and budgets of millions to create yet another epoch-shattering spectacular. There were the pioneering epics, such as Birth of a Nation and Gone with the Wind. There were the epics that made it, such as Spartacus, and the ones that didn’t, such as Cleopatra. There was blood and thunder in Ben-Hur, beauty and romance in Doctor Zhivago, Charlton Heston in half of them, Peter Ustinov in the rest, Rome falling daily, slaves rising weekly, wars won at least once a month, and several
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