Dune: Part One (2021)
(Video on Demand, January 2022) All right, let’s put a few cards on the table. I last read Frank Herbert’s Dune about a quarter-century ago, but I still think it’s one of the greatest Science Fiction novels ever written—a wonderful blend of space opera elements, strong atmosphere, great characterization and grander-than-life ideas. I haven’t seen the 2000 miniseries, but I really liked the glimpses we got from Jorodowsky’s Dune and I’m curiously partial to the wild baroque approach of David Lynch’s 1984 version of Dune, which I revisited last year and found much more enjoyable than expected—not to mention its quasi-iconic elements. My expectations for Denis Villeneuve’s new version were high—I really enjoy the fact that a French Canadian is the reigning king of Hollywood Science Fiction, and while I don’t necessarily love all of his earlier films, they’re easy to respect. Is he the right choice for Dune, however? I’m not sure. Oh, I liked this Dune: Part One all right—it’s immensely respectful of the original, fleshes out some of the things glossed upon during Lynch’s version, is so slickly directed as to be wonderful and manages some great casting coups. My initial disappointment at how it only adapted the first part of the novel was mollified by how the film’s success led to the greenlighting of the second half. On the other hand, this Part One does have a number of built-in issues. Some of them may disappear in time, once Part Two is here and delivers on all promises. Until then, however, we’re stuck not only with the first half of a story but an austere, slow-moving first half. Villeneuve’s approach is not wild and baroque: it’s ponderous, massive, more concerned with awe than pacing. It’s an approach all right, but there were a number of times that I found myself missing the wilder style of the 1984 version. (Ironically, this Dune is dumber when it does give in to the grandiose—its ornithopters make no sense at all.) As much as I’d like to like it, I’m stuck waiting for the second half to make up my mind. I did like a lot of the casting—Timothée Chalamet grew on me as the protagonist, which is more than I can say about Rebecca Ferguson. But Oscar Isaac, John Brolin, Dave Bautista, Jason Momoa and Javier Bardem all make for great characters. Sharon Duncan-Brewster gender-flips a rather dull role into an interesting character, and I guess we’ll get a lot more Zendaya in the next instalment. I’m not entirely happy with the pacing: the already laborious task of presenting a complex new universe is further slowed down by a slow pace, something that becomes increasingly irritating in the last act of the film, as what should have been a climax (the attack and exile) is drawn out into a too-long half hour meant to set up even more of the material. (It’s also a sequence that sees many of the most compelling and diverse characters die so that our duller Caucasian protagonist survives.) Still, generally speaking, I am cautiously optimistic about the upcoming Part Two based on this incomplete Part One—much of the groundwork is done, and now we’re ready to see the day where “the eyes of the galaxy turned toward Arrakis.” (Second Viewing, On Cable TV, May 2024) A second viewing of this Part One in close proximity with Part Two leaves me with one conclusion: I do respect Part One better now that I’ve seen its conclusion, but I don’t like it much more. Villeneuve’s epic style is synonymous with interminable (something that the last half-hour of Part One highlights all too well), and his iconography isn’t particularly memorable—especially if you compare it to the Lynch version. Oh, he does understand and execute the novel better than any version so far, but there’s clearly little concision to it. Even individual shots are easily twice as long as they need to be. But now that both parts of the film are out, don’t watch one without the other. Set aside the five hours and watch both—you’ll be awed, but maybe not as entertained as you’d like.
