You can buy silk flame torches, which look really cool if you are over about 10 feet away from it. They are basically a flame coloured bit of silk with a small fan which blows it upright, as well as a light to illuminate the silk, and the people arround it. The fan makes the silk flap arround which gives you the flicker of flames.
I just did a quick google, and found an (admittedly dodgey looking) silk flame torch for around $25 at a halloween shop -
URLI am sure they can be found for a lot cheaper, and a lot nicer looking.
However as you only have a few hours - I would just make fake torches out of paper/fabric etc - and either omit the flame, or make a paper one out of tissue papper, then do most of the 'fire lighting' using a few parcans on H-stands at the sides/front of stage. Basically you gel them red/yellow/orange/white and create a flickering chase - keep them all at about 25% for example, then create lots of steps where you bring one or two colours up a bit, or some channels down. The more steps you make, the better it looks (I have one in my effects library which is 1340 steps long which I used for a caveman scene).