To call Dune an experience is to sell it a little short. There’s more than one reason for this, chief among them being the fact that it was the first movie I’d seen in theatres since the start of COVID. I wanted to wait for it. I felt, over everything else being released, that this was the movie to see on the big screen and break another one of the taboos that popped up during the pandemic. I couldn’t have been more right, and my advice is for anyone who feels comfortable, has their vaccines, etc, to see this move in theatres.
Because Dune is an experience.
It’s also notoriously difficult material to adapt, and when pressed for an opinion on the movie, there was my divide. I think it’s as faithful and beautiful an adaptation as we’re likely to get, and both fortunately and unfortunately, it makes for a unique moviegoing experience. At best, Dune can be described as a slow burn. It’s early season Game of Thrones meets slower episodes of Star Trek.
On the complimentary side, this means you are immersed in a world of history, politics, and lore. The world of Dune feels lived in, real, and tense. That tension is the movie’s greatest asset. There is always a build, a shift, a plot in the works. There is no safety in Dune, no true shelter on Arrakis. This aura is created both through the stunning visuals, the sand and the heat and the technology all feel wrought from the same oppressive, ever-shifting universe, and through dialogue and characters that, at their best, feel larger than life. I don’t know if there’s a single actor whose performance I cannot praise. It’s Shakespearean, the grandeur of not just the world and its people but also the stakes and the plot.
To its discredit, this can create an unfortunate sense of melodrama and drag brought on by the slow-burn nature of the plot and dialogue. Despite some excellent action sequences (I do not know if I will ever find a better planetary invasion sequence in my lifetime), Dune is first and foremost about politics, religion, and myth. The success of the adaptation means that, like the source material, the film Dune is dense, can feel as though it’s plodding through the sands itself, and rests heavily on its exposition to payoff moments that are intended to be grand (and more often than not, actually are).
Those familiar with the source material, and to those who are even fans of the original book, won’t find this a problem. We know what to expect, and in that sense I think the film overdelivers (it even throws in a cheeky tease here and there for things we think we know- such is the power of adaptation). To those unfamiliar, Dune runs the risk of being, if anything, overwhelming (but, then, so is the book). That may also work in its favor, as the film can rest on its stunning visuals (words cannot describe how much I want a thopter), excellent performances (yes, some of these characters are meant to be emotionless to a fault), and decent soundtrack (though, I do feel Hans Zimmer can cool it off a little at certain moments (pun intended)).
Writing with the knowledge of a greenlit Part II (oh, yes, this is only Dune Part I), I am excited to watch the deepest, sturdiest, most impactful world in science fiction continue. As a beginner writer, Dune stands tall as an examination of rich worldbuilding, and a representation of the intense interconnectivity of everything essential to life. Lessons in fear and in hope, in the environment and its resources, in the respect owed both to otherworldly cultures and familiar enemies, and in the power of stories themselves all swirl on the sands of Arrakis.
Dune.
Desert Planet.
It’s enchanting, entrancing, and perpetually tempting.
It’s Dune, an experience larger than any one life, planet, or story.