Review: Dune

Image courtesy of Warner Bros.

Denis Villeneuve's adaptation of Frank Herbert's "Dune" is a more coherent - if, perhaps, not quite as fun - adaptation of the classic science-fiction novel than David Lynch's maligned, but since more positively reevaluated, version of the story. While Lynch's film featured some of the idiosyncrasies typically associated with that director as well as a welcome dose of camp, Villeneuve's is much more self-serious and hews more closely to the novel.

However, Lynch's version was more compact, squeezing the entire epic into a two-hour-plus movie, whereas Villeneuve's picture is only "Part 1" of "Dune," meaning that like so many other big budget Hollywood movies of late - the recent "Halloween," numerous "Star Wars" or comic book movies, for example - the film is somewhat of a means for drawing audiences back in for more. Sort of how the final "Harry Potter" movie didn't really need a first and second part, "Dune" probably could have been condensed to allow for a longer movie without a second part.

Regardless, it's often great to look at and features a terrific cast - Timothy Chalamet, Stellan Skarsgard, Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin, Oscar Isaac, Charlotte Rampling, Dave Bautista and others. Trying to explain the plot of "Dune" might be a fruitless task, but here goes: two families - the House of Atreides (the good guys) and the House of Harkonnen (the villains) have been vying for the emperor's favor to be the tender of a planet that holds the galaxy's most valuable resource - spice.

The House of Atreides, led by Duke Leto (Isaac), has been led to believe that it has been chosen by the emperor, and Leto tells his son, Paul (Chalamet), that one day he will be responsible for leading the family, a task that Paul doesn't know if he's up to. Meanwhile, Paul's mother, Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson), is involved with a group of mystics who hold a power known as "The Voice," which Lady Jessica has tried to instill in her son.

Some have said that "Dune" influenced George Lucas's "Star Wars" movies, and it's easy to see how - the desert locales, the "Voice" being an influence on "The Force," intergalactic space opera elements, a "chosen one" character (Luke in "Star Wars," Paul in "Dune") and monstrous creatures (in "Dune," the objects of fear are the gigantic sandworms that populate the desert). 

Just as Paul believes he has started to master "The Voice," a betrayal leads to the Harkonnen taking over Arrakis, the spice planet, and Paul and his mother must throw in their lot with the Fremen, the people who live in the deserts of that planet. Leto had attempted to make peace with the Fremen, but now Paul has no other choice but to team up with them. Zendaya pops up in the final scenes of the movie as Paul's love interest, Chani. 

And that's basically where the story ends, for now. As I'd mentioned before, the film was seemingly intentionally split into two for the purpose of making more money out of a new franchise. Perhaps, the filmmakers thought the story was too long to fit properly into one movie, although Lynch was able to - then again, his version was more of a Lynch film than a by-the-book adaptation of a novel that its fans consider somewhat sacred.

The two films each have their own merits. Lynch's was more bizarre and some sequences - the sandworms, the portrayal of the Baron of Harkonnen and the Gom Jabbar "hand in the box" sequence" - were better handled in the 1984 version. Villeneuve's version takes the story more seriously as a drama, it has some gorgeous cinematography, its story is better laid out and the characters are a little more two dimensional. Chalamet does a fine job as Atreides, and most of the cast provides solid supporting work.

So, while I might not find the new "Dune" to be a great epic as some early reviews have called it, it's a well made, mostly engaging sci-fi blockbuster that sets up a sequel to finish telling its story. "Dune" has long been called a notoriously difficult story to adapt to the screen, but Villeneuve - who also pulled off the seemingly difficult task of making a "Blade Runner" sequel - has risen to the challenge. In other words, so far so good.