It is the year 10,191, navigating the cosmos is dependent on a hallucinogenic substance called Spice. The Spice can only be found on the planet Arrakis, also known as Dune.
The long-awaited 2nd part of Denis Villeneuve's Dune is out so let's take a look at 1984's Dune., courtesy of pauldudar.com. The David Lynch directed, Dino De Laurentius produced, sci-fi monstrosity/pre-built-cult-classic Dune, based on Frank Herbert's 1965 epic novel of the same name. It features an all-star cast including Kyle MacLachlan, Jurgen Prochnow, Brad Dourif, Sean Young, Dean Stockwell, Jose Ferrer, Virginia Madsen, Linda Hunt, Richard Jordan, Everett McGill, Max von Sydow, Patrick Stewart, and Sting. That's right STING! From The Police.
This legendary box-office bomb disappointed critics and fans alike. The combination of studio-imposed run-time cuts and the reputation of De Laurentis spelled disaster for Lynch's Dune. This sci-fi classic was strangled in the cradle.
THE EDGE
David Lynch should not have directed this film. PERIOD. I love his work, but he had never directed anything approaching a sci-fi epic. He’d never read the book before it was offered to him. It should have been Ridley Scott or Paul Verhoven. Lynch’s style and creative choices are way too weird to work in a broad-base appeal sci-fi flick. Lynch's decision to make Barron Harkonnen an obese floating man with zits the size of walnuts bathing in blood is one example of many weird additions. The scene here is a great example of why Lynch was a bad choice.
This scene isn’t in the book and serves little purpose. What fights did Lynch have with the studio to keep that scene? What other gems were sacrificed for the cat milking scene? Also, I would have loved to be the guy to explain the necessity of cat milking to Sting. This is why you shouldn’t give an epic to an auteur.
Unfortunately, the film relies waaaaay too much on whispered non-diegetic inner-monologues to help fill in the gaps of the cuts. If you hadn’t at least tried to read the book before you saw the movie, you’re probably gonna be a little lost.
I usually reserve this section to explain why an established classic/otherwise great film is also a bad film. But, since Dune is already thought of as a terrible movie, this reviewer will take the opportunity to delve into the reasons why this film is worthy of re-examination.
As stated earlier, the source novel is over 600pgs, to boil that down to a feature-length film worth watching is extraordinarily difficult. Think of Dune as the Lord of the Rings but they crammed all three movies into one movie that is less than 2 hours. This being the case the film remains as faithful as it possibly could have been.
The production design is stellar. The VFX don’t hold up but they would have been top-notch for the time and every performer is doing their best with a butchered script.
I can say with certainty, that this is the best Patrick Stewart and Sting collaboration in history!
THE LOWDOWN
There’s no doubt about it, this movie would have been a nightmare to work on if you were David Lynch or working closely with him. Lynch was constantly getting the run around from producers. To this day, Lynch refuses to talk about the film and occasionally has his name taken off the credits for certain cuts.
If you were a performer in Dune, it sounds like you had a great time. Patrick Stewart spoke of his experiences a few years ago. Sounds awesome!
One thing you can’t take away from the film is its cast. It is awesome. Top-drawer performers and seasoned pros who would have been jazzed to be working with each other, even though the rest of the film is hot garbage. You can check my IMDb, I’ve worked on some not-so-great films, but had an awesome time working on them because of a great cast and crew.
The stillsuits, the main garb of the Fremen, were made of foam rubber which is horrible to put on and stay in all day. It would be difficult enough to have a handful of performers in them, but there are scenes in Dune featuring performers over 100 stillsuits.
It would be especially challenging to in the stifling heat of the Grand Desert of Altar in Sonora, Mexico.
THE JIST
If you like Dune, you should give it a watch. If you don’t you can pass. If you like weird and culty, could-have-been-good movies, this is the movie for you.
Release the Lynch cut! I want to see this 2-hour train wreck extended to 5 hours! The footage is somewhere, it must be. Let’s start the trend #releasethelynchcut
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