Dune: Part One (2021)
dir. Denis Villeneuve
Rated: PG-13
image: ©2021 Warner Bros. Pictures
I’ll start my review of Dune: Part One by using one epic fantasy tale to comment on another. In The Waste Lands, the third book of Stephen King’s sprawling Dark Tower series, Roland, the hero from another world, asks to hear stories from the Wizard of Oz books. His response when asked why is, “The quickest way to learn about a new place is to know what it dreams of.” Denis Villeneuve’s adaptation of author Frank Herbert’s serpentine 1965 novel Dune dreams of a pitiless, insatiable greed for power and riches, colonialist subjugation of marginalized societies, and a savior who promises to right all. Fifty-five years after the publication of the source material, Villeneuve’s stunning translation of Dune for the screen shows that whether it be 2021, 1965, or 1065, humanity’s preoccupations haven’t changed much.
Set over 8000 years in the future, in 10191, humans have mastered travel between the stars, and settled plants throughout the galaxy. The priceless substance mélange, colloquially called “spice,” is a psychotropic drug that enhances human mental capability and is also used as a fuel to achieve interstellar travel. Spice can only be found on one planet, Arrakis, an inhospitable desert planet and home to Brobdingnagian sandworms, which make the harvesting of spice a difficult and deadly proposition.
Dune is the story of Paul Atreides, heir to the powerful House Atreides. The ruler of the known galaxy, Padishah Emperor Shaddam IV, is a jealous and untrusting despot, and he fears House Atreides’s power might usurp his own. In a plan to sow chaos and instability, the emperor has taken away stewardship responsibilities of Arrakis, and the spice mining riches that come with it, from House Harkonnen, a cruel, beastly faction, and granted it to House Atreides. The emperor is counting on House Harkonnen to sabotage the incoming administration, which will break House Atreides’s power when spice production is disrupted. The emperor will then hand the planet and the lucrative spice industry back over to House Harkonnen.
At its heart, Dune is one more in the long history of mythical quest stories chronicling the hero’s journey, as most famously detailed by professor and author Joseph Campbell. Paul is our Christ-figure. Like Neo in The Matrix films, Paul is referred to as The One throughout Dune. His mother, Lady Jessica, who is a member of the exclusively female mystical sect known as the Bene Gesserit, sees that young Paul is destined for great things. The group’s leadership believed that Lady Jessica would birth a messiah known as the Kwisatz Haderach. They instructed Jessica to birth a daughter – members of the Bene Gesserit can seemingly determine the sex of their offspring – but Jessica defied them because she believes the Kwisatz Haderach will be male.
Having never read the source material, I can’t say if one exchange between Jessica and Gaius Helen Mohiam, a powerful figure in the Bene Gesserit sect, can be found there, or if it’s an invention of screenwriters Villeneuve, Jon Spaihts, and Eric Roth. (I’ve only seen David Lynch’s 1984 adaptation of Dune once. It is as much of a mess as its reputation suggests.) In the sequence, Mohiam chides Jessica for birthing a son, since power is, in the eyes of the Bene Gesserit, “wasted in males.” It’s a clever nod to our society’s shifting views on who is most effective in the wielding of power. At least it would have been if the movie hadn’t then quickly refocused on its male messianic figure.
There’s a certain understated fascism at work in Dune as well. Paul is portrayed as a noble young man. His father, Duke Leto, suspects the devious plot at the heart of the emperor’s reorganization of power, but his own plan involves building an alliance with the Fremen, the subjugated indigenous peoples of Arrakis, which he hopes will bring balance and peace to all of the Houses. If you know anything about the hero’s journey, and knowing that Paul is The One, it’s not hard to guess that Dune: Part Two will chronicle Paul bringing his father’s plans to fruition.
It might be because the world of Dune has little in the way of heroes outside of Paul – much like life here on planet Earth, almost every character is solely focused on the accumulation of wealth and power; in Dune, it’s through the mining of spice – but this story reminds me of how dangerous it is to trust in a singular person to solve any and all problems. When people give that much power to one person, he (or she, I’m an equal opportunity believer that power makes monsters, regardless of gender) will become as ruthless and paranoid as the emperor in Dune.
I suppose what makes someone like Paul different is that he doesn’t seek the power that is inevitably thrust upon him. Authoritarians, like Vladimir Putin or Donald Trump, are eager to cast themselves as the savior who alone can solve every problem single-handedly.
Paul is also a white savior in an allegory where spice is oil and the Fremen are Arabs. For over a century now, the people of the Middle East have been subjected to the often-violent machinations of Western countries in an effort to control a priceless resource. There’s a satisfying critique of colonialism running throughout Dune, even if the ultimate hero of the story comes from the power structure that does the subjugating, instead of the oppressed class.
Dune: Part Two might prove me wrong, but the Fremen are periphery characters in this first installment, which roughly covers the first half of Herbert’s novel. One Fremen woman, whom Paul sees in prophetic dreams, promises to be the plot device that will drive Paul to fulfil his destiny.
The real strength of Dune, what held me enthralled and in awe throughout its 2.5+ hour running time, is director Denis Villeneuve’s singular aesthetic vision and astonishing execution of that vision. In Villeneuve’s hands, I was transported to places I could never have imagined. The world-building that Villeneuve and his artistic collaborators have achieved with this picture is beyond breathtaking.
Villeneuve has created the Lawrence of Arabia of science fiction/fantasy.
The sound design alone, from composer Hans Zimmer’s thrumming, idiosyncratic score, to the movie’s intricate diegetic soundscape, is a wonder. The bass-heavy design for “the voice,” a hypnotic way of speaking that the Bene Gesserit, including Paul and Lady Jessica, use to control the will of others, is otherworldly. Costume designers Bob Morgan and Jacqueline West, taking a cue from the story’s allegoric themes, lean heavily on an Islamic aesthetic. It’s one that features veils for the female characters, the most distinctive of which obscures the face of English actress Charlotte Rampling, who portrays the Bene Gesserit Reverend Mother – and the emperor’s Truthsayer – Gaius Helen Mohiam.
The cast of Dune is a murderers’ row of Hollywood talent. Timothée Chalamet is strong yet incredibly vulnerable as Paul Atreides. Rebecca Ferguson as Lady Jessica gives a quiet and surreal performance that belies her character’s strength. Oscar Isaac turns in a dour interpretation of Paul’s father, Duke Leto Atreides. Isaac’s Leto carries the weight of several worlds on his shoulders and Isaac telegraphs that pressure splendidly. Josh Brolin and Jason Momoa bring the closest thing Dune has to comic relief in Paul’s mentors, Gurney Halleck and Duncan Idaho. (I think Frank Herbert must have flat-out run out of ideas when he named Idaho.)
In a testament to the incredible work of the makeup artists of Dune, Swedish actor Stellan Skarsgård is unrecognizable as the vicious leader of House Harkonnen, Baron Vladimir Harkonnen. The line between makeup, prosthetics, and visual effects become blurred in Skarsgård’s haunting visage. Dave Bautista adds to the physically intimidating ranks of House Harkonnen as Vladimir’s nephew, Glossu Rabban. I’m sure we’ll see much more of her in Dune: Part Two, but even what little we see of Zendaya as Chani, the Fremen woman Paul sees in his dreams, and his inevitable love interest, is intoxicating.
It seems hard to believe, if you haven’t seen Dune, but the eye-popping visual landscape Villeneuve crafted in Blade Runner 2049 – a film I was only mildly positive on, despite its exceptional visual design – was merely, in retrospect, a warm-up act for the masterpiece he has achieved here. The director has talked about how making his own version of the novel has been a longstanding dream of his. He’s also described Dune as being “a world that takes its power in details.” It’s obvious from watching only a few minutes of his film that Villeneuve sweated over every single one of those details. The resulting work of art is quite astonishing.
Why it got 4 stars:
- My reservations about the white-saviorism and fascistic tendencies of Dune notwithstanding (and I recognize the privilege that a straight, white, cis-gender man like myself has to make it easier to overlook these issues), Villeneuve’s artistic achievement here is astonishing.
Things I forgot to mention in my review, because, well, I'm the Forgetful Film Critic:
- I mentioned in the main review how much I enjoyed the score and sound design of the film. While that’s true, it’s also a VERY LOUD movie. Or maybe the theater I was in had it cranked to eleven. It was irritating at times, and Rae had to put in earplugs half-way through. Did anyone else out there have this issue?
- The device of having Paul learn about his soon-to-be new home world of Arrakis by listening to pre-recorded tutorials works as a seamless way to introduce non-invasive exposition for the audience that avoids being completely clunky.
- Coolest vehicle design of the movie (or any movie, for that matter): the insect like ornithopters. Think helicopters with giant dragonfly wings.
- Thankfully Villeneuve’s visual design team made the giant sandworms resemble something like the Sarlacc from Return of the Jedi, as opposed to a giant anus, like the sandworms in Lynch’s version of Dune.
Close encounters with people in movie theaters:
- This was a good, old-fashioned Friday night showing with close to a full house. I went with Rae and our two friends (shout out to the O’Brotherfords!). It was glorious to experience an epic sci-fi/fantasy like Dune in this atmosphere.