The magneto-optical (MO) Faraday effect of one-dimensional photonic crystals (1D-PCs) composed of Bi-substituted yttrium-iron-garnet films and dielectric films such as SiO2 and TiO2 films were studied theoretically. Because of considerable localization of light, these media exhibit a very large MO effect. For instance, when the film structure is chosen to be appropriate for supporting the localization of light, the 1D-PC films can possess a huge Faraday rotation angle reaching to - 28 deg/mu m at lambda = 1.15 mu m. The analysis reveals that the MO characteristics of the 1D-PC films are almost governed by the degree of localization of light, which can be controlled by varying the number of reflection layers in the films. (C) 1998 American Institute of Physics. [S0021-8979(98)44711-X].