I’ve never understood the buzz around Dune. I first read the books in my early twenties, and whilst I enjoyed them, there was better sci-fi about the place. I understand that the novels had no peers when they landed in public consciousness. Published a decade after Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, Dune was bold and different in all the best ways. It was original and inventive and made of many new elements; it was soaked in the zeitgeist of the time, weaving counter-culture themes of psychedelics and spirituality with royal court intrigue and deeper scientific themes around understanding, comprehension and human advancement. Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out by Timothy Leary appeared less than a year after Dune was first published. Marvin Minsky’s work of the same period also shaped our thoughts on neural networks and AI today. So, it is easy to imagine just how impactful Dune was. The question, though, is why is it impactful now? Indeed, reading it almost forty years after it came out, I was struck by how the novel seemed anachronistic, dated and stale. It was not a bad book or a poor story; it was just the shoulders that many other more enjoyable novels stood upon.
Fast-forward almost sixty years ahead of the novel’s initial publication date, and I am left struggling to understand why the movie version of Dune is attracting such hype. Cards on the table time: I think it is the second part of a poor movie. I think it is a dull, poorly acted CGI fest that manages to denude the novel of intrigue and interest. It is a photocopy of a photocopy of a picture taken of a picture. It is what Denis Villeneuve does best: makes coffee table books that catch the eye by having little to no depth. The question is, why is there such hype and universal praise for such a mediocre offering? Does amazing cinematography and epic sound design beat out plot, acting, direction, pacing and logic? For me, no.
I went into the first movie with high hopes. I was captivated by the trailers and ready for some good sci-fi. I was done with people passing off shitey Star Wars as sci-fi. The time was nigh for Hollywood to cough up something befitting the most epic of genres. And with true Hollywood timing, they let us down. Twenty-odd minutes into the first movie, I knew I would not be treated to visionary genius. I knew the film translation of what had once been a landmark work would be lacking. Villeneuve was doing to this novel what JJ Abrams had done to Star Trek: kept the explosions and characters and jettisoned everything else interesting out of the airlock. So the question remains: why? Why do all these subpar remakes and rehashes get through to modern audiences? Why such hype over abject failure? Why is this the best Hollywood can do?
I have several theories. Emphasis on theories. I shall start with the fucking tragic state of modern cinema. Dune 2 is simply the best of a rotten bunch. Indeed, there are so many much worse movies. The Beekeeper, for one, and I like Statham. The Beekeeper doesn’t pretend to be high art, however.
“In a perfect world, I’d make a compelling movie that doesn’t feel like an experiment but does not have a single word in it either. People would leave the cinema and say, ‘Wait, there was no dialogue?’ But they won’t feel the lack.” - Denis Villeneuve
Villeneuve firmly puts his work in the high art bracket. Indeed, many of the shots and set pieces almost achieve it. The product as a whole, however, falls badly short. It sacrifices pacing, sufficient dialogue, plot and character development to achieve a vision which, at best, is flawed and, at worst, is just fucking dumb. Dune is a story of complexity, a tale with many moving parts, and Villeneuve seeks to represent this in a medium supremely unsuited to the task. How many of us can stare at a cutaway section of a rocket engine and then go on to opine intelligently on all the subtle nuances of its function?
The story of Dune lives on the screen as a dancing skeleton devoid of the vibrant anatomy Frank Herbert created. Gone is the Spacing Guild, much of the court intrigue, and anything revealing the true depth of the meddling the Bene Gessarit get up to on a galactic scale. Absent is the plotting and scheming, replaced by weak dialogue. Thrust into this mix is the emotionally empty Chalamet, a glaikit plank of wood upon which we are invited to project our emotions, for he has none. His range is as limited as the weather on Arrakis. I could go on to pick on the other actors, but that would be a waste of time given that most of them I like and most of them also phoned their performances in. Chalomet stands out since he never ceases to make me feel like I am watching someone read dialogue. His inability to drag me into a fictional world makes me wonder, in turn, if Timothee Chalomet is fictional himself.
Lastly, I wish to return to my initial point: I’ve never understood the buzz around Dune. Sure, I understand the hype from the '60s and '70s, but not the modern incarnation. Perhaps a renewed interest in AI (since it is supposedly here…) explains some of the interest. Or perhaps the return of something akin to the hippish interests and notions of the sixties is back and making this story again chime with the spirit of the time. I doubt any of that, however. I just think that a filmmaker born two years after Dune’s initial publication has been allowed to attempt what various other filmmakers have wanted to and has failed in new, bright and stunningly loud ways.
In summary, Dune Part Two is the worst type of trash. It is made by competent filmmakers who, since it is fashionable, have decided that whatever makes an original work worthwhile should be cast aside in favour of bland, shallow imagery and weak purpose. Like so much that is remade, Dune has been sacrificed on an altar where art and creativity bleed out for profit. Dune will be a stunning hit, and an army of boring cinema-geek pontificators (AKA critics) shall expel gallons of piss into our pockets, telling us it is rain. I shall, as per usual, not listen to any of them, especially if they unironically say “woke”. I will, instead, spend my own time slagging this cultural garbage off and writing about it, especially for you, because, just like with politicians, Hollywood doesn’t give a flying fuck about what you want. So why get upset? Unless it is to write blog posts, don’t bother. Best be like sweet Timothee’s face: care and emotion-free.