Best Epic Fantasy Movies on Criterion Channel

Every epic fantasy movie streaming on Criterion Channel in the US right now — 16 films ranked by rating, checked against Criterion Channel’s live catalog.

Updated July 2026 · Availability refreshed from Criterion Channel US

1

The Seventh Seal (1957)

IMDb 8.1 🍅 93% Letterboxd 4.3 1h 36m

Directed by Ingmar Bergman

✦ MovieMuse AI takeBergman transforms the Death figure into an actual negotiating force, grounding existential dread in iconic, chessboard imagery.

When disillusioned Swedish knight Antonius Block returns home from the Crusades to find his country in the grips of the Black Death, he challenges Death to a chess match for his life. Tormented by the belief that God does not exist, Block sets off on a journey, meeting up with traveling players Jof and his wife, Mia, and becoming determined to evade Death long enough to commit one redemptive act while he still lives.

2

Ugetsu (1953)

IMDb 8.1 🍅 100% Letterboxd 4.3 1h 36m

Directed by Kenji Mizoguchi

✦ MovieMuse AI takeMizoguchi layers historical tragedy with supernatural consequence—a peasant's curse becomes the film's moral architecture.

In 16th century Japan, peasants Genjuro and Tobei sell their earthenware pots to a group of soldiers in a nearby village, in defiance of a local sage's warning against seeking to profit from warfare. Genjuro's pursuit of both riches and the mysterious Lady Wakasa, as well as Tobei's desire to become a samurai, run the risk of destroying both themselves and their wives, Miyagi and Ohama.

3

The Hidden Fortress (1958)

IMDb 8.0 🍅 96% Letterboxd 4.2 2h 19m

Directed by Akira Kurosawa

✦ MovieMuse AI takeKurosawa invents the sword-fantasy action grammar: peasant perspectives democratize samurai epics while maintaining mythic weight.

In feudal Japan, during a bloody war between clans, two cowardly and greedy peasants, soldiers of a defeated army, stumble upon a mysterious man who guides them to a fortress hidden in the mountains.

4

The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926)

IMDb 7.8 🍅 100% Letterboxd 4.0 1h 6m

Directed by Lotte Reiniger

✦ MovieMuse AI takeStop-motion silhouettes create mythic grandeur; Arabian Nights fantasy crystallized in pure visual storytelling.

Taken from The Arabian Nights, a wicked sorcerer and the beautiful prince Achmed battle one against the other during a series of wondrous adventures.

5

The Fabulous Baron Munchausen (1962)

IMDb 7.7 Letterboxd 4.1 1h 25m

Directed by Karel Zeman

✦ MovieMuse AI takeSurrealist imagination weaponized: Méliès-inspired moonscapes collapse rational space into impossible adventure.

A 20th century man lands on the Moon and discovers that Baron Munchausen has beaten him to it, accompanied by Cyrano de Bergerac and the characters from Jules Verne's novels about the conquest of the satellite.

6

Miracle in Milan (1951)

IMDb 7.6 🍅 92% Letterboxd 3.9 1h 37m

Directed by Vittorio De Sica

✦ MovieMuse AI takeDe Sica merges neorealist poverty with magical realism—Totò's miracles emerge from material desperation, making magic socially urgent.

Once upon a time a wise and kind old woman discovers a baby in her cabbage patch. She brings up the child and, when she dies, the boy, Totò, enters an orphanage. Totò leaves the orphanage a happy young man, and looks for work in post-war Milan. He ends up with the homeless and organizes them to build a shanty town in a vacant lot. But when greedy developers threaten the community’s land, Totò will need all the help he can get in order to find an impossible way out.

7

Watership Down (1978)

IMDb 7.5 🍅 81% Letterboxd 3.9 1h 32m

Directed by Martin Rosen

✦ MovieMuse AI takeAnimal protagonists achieve genuine epic scope; pastoral quest narratives prove fantasy's most primal form.

When the warren belonging to a community of rabbits is threatened, a brave group led by Fiver, Bigwig, Blackberry and Hazel leave their homeland in a search of a safe new haven.

8

A Touch of Zen (1970)

IMDb 7.5 🍅 97% Letterboxd 4.1 3h 0m

Directed by King Hu

✦ MovieMuse AI takeWuxia mysticism transforms romantic intrigue into metaphysical combat; martial arts become philosophical language.

Gu Sheng-zhai, an artist in his early 30s, still lives with his mother, but he is suddenly shaken by the arrival of Yang Hui-zhen, a mysterious princess on the run. Yang brings Gu into her circle of protectors, including a nameless monk whose spiritual guidance transforms him into a valiant fighter.

9

The Thief of Bagdad (1940)

IMDb 7.4 🍅 100% Letterboxd 3.7 1h 47m

Directed by Michael Powell

✦ MovieMuse AI takeTechnicolor opulence makes magic tactile; every frame insists fantasy belongs in sensory, lived worlds.

When Prince Ahmad is blinded and cast out of Bagdad by the nefarious Jaffar, he joins forces with the scrappy thief Abu to win back his royal place, as well as the heart of a beautiful princess.

10

The Legend of the Swordsman (1992)

IMDb 7.1 🍅 67% Letterboxd 3.6 1h 47m

Directed by Tony Ching Siu-Tung

✦ MovieMuse AI takeSwordsman mythology compressed into intimate character study; wuxia explores hermitage as ultimate heroic choice.

Ling Wu Chung decides to hide from the chaotic world. Before leaving, he visits his friends, a tribe of snake-wielding women warriors. However, he finds that the tribe have been attacked, and their leader Yam Ying Ying has been abducted.

11

Testament of Orpheus (1960)

IMDb 7.1 🍅 88% Letterboxd 3.9 1h 20m

Directed by Jean Cocteau

✦ MovieMuse AI takeCocteau's temporal fluidity dissolves genre boundaries; poet-as-hero transcends fantasy's narrative conventions entirely.

An 18th century poet travels through time in search of divine wisdom. In a mysterious wasteland, he has a series of enigmatic encounters with symbolic phantoms with whom he muses about the nature of art and his own career. Ultimately, the poet strives to achieve his rebirth as a celestial being.

12

Journey to the Beginning of Time (1955)

IMDb 7.1 Letterboxd 3.6 1h 25m

Directed by Karel Zeman

✦ MovieMuse AI takePrehistoric awe restored through practical effects; dinosaur sequences rediscover primal wonder genre demands.

Four schoolboys go on an awe-inspiring expedition back through time, where they behold landscapes and creatures that have long since vanished from the earth.

13

Donkey Skin (1970)

IMDb 7.0 🍅 89% Letterboxd 4.0 1h 30m

Directed by Jacques Demy

✦ MovieMuse AI takeDonkey Skin costume operates as fairy-tale logic made flesh; Demy's aesthetic transforms metamorphosis into grace.

A fairy godmother helps a princess disguise herself so she won't have to marry her father.

14

Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (1970)

IMDb 7.0 🍅 81% Letterboxd 3.5 1h 13m

Directed by Jaromil Jireš

✦ MovieMuse AI takeCzechoslovak surrealism infiltrates coming-of-age; grotesque imagery suggests fantasy's darker ceremonial dimensions.

Valerie, a Czechoslovakian teenager living with her grandmother, is blossoming into womanhood, but that transformation proves secondary to the effects she experiences when she puts on a pair of magic earrings. Now seeing the world around her in a different light, Valerie must endure her sexual awakening while attempting to discern reality from fantasy as she encounters lecherous priest Gracian, a vampire-like stranger and otherworldly carnival folk.

15

Time Bandits (1981)

IMDb 6.9 🍅 92% Letterboxd 3.5 1h 56m

Directed by Terry Gilliam

✦ MovieMuse AI takeTime-jumping adventure through history via magical map subverts epic fantasy tropes through comedic, absurdist whimsy.

Young history buff Kevin can scarcely believe it when six dwarfs emerge from his closet one night. Former employees of the Supreme Being, they've purloined a map charting all of the holes in the fabric of time and are using it to steal treasures from different historical eras. Taking Kevin with them, they variously drop in on Napoleon, Robin Hood and King Agamemnon before the Supreme Being catches up with them.

16

The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976)

IMDb 6.6 🍅 79% Letterboxd 3.5 2h 19m

Directed by Nicolas Roeg

✦ MovieMuse AI takeScience-fiction's cold precision inverts fantasy's metaphoric warmth; alien-as-outsider becomes melancholic epic.

Thomas Jerome Newton is an alien who has come to Earth in search of water to save his home planet. Aided by lawyer Oliver Farnsworth, Thomas uses his knowledge of advanced technology to create profitable inventions. While developing a method to transport water, Thomas meets Mary-Lou, a quiet hotel clerk, and begins to fall in love with her. Just as he is ready to leave Earth, Thomas is intercepted by the U.S. government, and his entire plan is threatened.