Jess of the Shire
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Some thoughts on Dune 2 part 2...
🕑 Added 2024-03-04 20:56:51 +0000 UTCDune 2 is not a one-for-one retelling of Frank Herbert’s classic Dune novel. And honestly, I don’t really mind.
The changes that Villenueve made to the story will probably make some people mad. And that’s fine, but as someone who talks and thinks about the art of adaptation a lot, I can’t bring myself to hold these changes against this incredible piece of science fiction storytelling. Because movies like this, getting made in today’s climate, give me a lot of hope for the future of fantasy and Sci-fi filmmaking.
So before we start comparing and contrasting, let’s talk about what worked in this movie. (This is going to contain Dune spoilers. Beware.)
Visually, Dune 2 is a feast. Its cinematography is incredibly fluid, while still taking long moments to linger on gorgeous cinematic snapshots. The filmmakers knew which moments die-hard fans would be looking to see (the worm ride, the Fremen council, Feyd and Paul’s fight) and let those moments breathe with beautiful symmetry and symbolic imagery. I’m not a cinematic expert of any kind, but it was just beautiful; incredibly dramatic while still having the grit and realism you want from Arrakis.
The soundtrack and sound design were just as stunning. Paul and Chani’s theme was a particular standout, it captures the sweetness of their relationship, along with the sorrow inherent to it. Hans Zimmer created such an interesting soundscape, especially with the low, grinding noises that came in at particular universe-altering moments. It was like you could feel the gears of space and time turning. I think my favorite thing in terms of soundtrack sound design were how many moments of silence there were. Rather than punctuating key moments like Feyd’s death with a musical moment, telling the audience how they should feel, it was just dead silence.
The acting was very strong all around, especially Zendaya. There was significantly more humor in this film, and most of it landed well. I especially love the moments when Paul feels like a new kid on the first day of school. All of the relationships, from Paul and Stilgar, to Chani and Jessica, to Chani and Paul developed very naturally in short periods of time, and are both enjoyable and complex.
Now, let’s talk about some of the more significant changes from book to movie (this will also be its own video someday so I won’t go too in depth, but still…)
The largest gripe you could probably have is that Villenueve removed many of Dune’s wackier elements, and I was certainly missing them. For example, I love that toddler-aged Alia kills the Baron Harkonnen in the book. It’s very funny, but it’s also a poignant moment of showing him his place. There’s not a lot that’s more humiliating than being killed by your own toddler granddaughter.
However, this would look ridiculous onscreen. It just would. And Villenueve was not going for ridiculous.
Instead, they have Alia “possessing” Lady Jessica, which both incorporates hercharacter, (without the sentient toddler problems) and also evokes Alia’s later storyline. Villenueve does not plan on making a Children of Dune movie, so I understand trying to work in a possession plotline where you can.
This does, of course, alter Jessica’s character, but I don’t mind. I think we could already see this coming in the first film, when they emphasize her conceiving of Paul not as a result of love for Leto, but out of pride. She is a much more villainous character, and though I miss her book character, this will solve the problem of her absence from the entirety of Messiah’s story.
I also missed a lot of the Harkonnen trickery, especially with Feyd Rautha. In the books, Feyd’s secret poison darts are such a key part of the character. It proves that the Harkonnens are planners to their bones. They always have a trick up their sleeves.
Meanwhile, in the final battle between Paul and Feyd, Paul is supposed to have a secret kill word that will shut Feyd down, something that didn’t make it into the film. I assume this was cut for the sake of simplicity, which I do understand, but the contrast of Feyd having an ace up his sleeve and using it, and Paul having one too, but choosing not to, is so important. Like his grandfather, Paul Atreides faces the bull head-on, with no safety measures in place.
It’s a beautiful moment from the book, but the scene still retained its dramatic integrity without it.
Dillon pointed out the very interesting fact that the Feyd of the movies is actually pretty honorable. He’s a sociopath, and quite cruel, but he has a twisted sort of valor, respecting at least the tenets of Battle. It sets him up far more clearly as a parallel to Paul, someone who could have been the Kwisatz Haderach,
Then of course, there’s the changes made to Chani. I think these were made for two main reasons.
There’s the simple fact that Villnueve couldn’t make use of internal monologue like Herbert could. We couldn’t see Stilgar’s complex internal journey from skepticism to acceptance. Instead, Villenueve gave us Chani and Stilgar as the two ends of the spectrum, and allowed Paul to bounce between their poles, as he tries to determine if he is man or messiah. This allowed the internal debates of these characters to be externalized, and far more visible to new audiences.
The changes made to Chani also, frankly, gave her more of an actual character. I enjoy Chani in the books, but she really does get set on the backburner. Her love for Paul is never changing, never really challenged. They are a done deal from the first few moments of their meeting. In a book, where we’re reading about a faceless character, this is easier to swallow. In a movie, where we would be watching a human actor in this role, buffeted about by cruel fate, never really fighting back against the men around her, it would be a harder pill to swallow.
Instead, Villnueve gave Chani a very significant journey, introducing complex conflict into their relationship. I think I’ll have to reserve final judgements on her character until movie 3 when their relationship is resolved, because if she never comes around to accept Paul, A. the movie would not work and B. I would be sad because I love the two of them.
I won’t try to say that these are not very significant changes. However, most of them felt incredibly intentional, and I could trace the logic behind them. When he took out something, like Feyd’s poison darts, he added something else in, like making Feyd a more honorable man, and a stronger opponent.
It’s easy to forget, when almost every other part of a movie is perfect, that the medium of film is so different to a novel. There are things that Herbert achieved in the original tale that are just impossible to do in the story Villenueve was telling. But I think we were very fortunate that this movie was made by someone who understands those differences and allows the story to thrive, and change, for worse and for better.
The fact remains, if you want an exact, page for page recreation of Dune, you’ll have to read the book. While Dune 2 isn’t a perfect recreation, it is an excellent adaptation, and its slower pace, attention to detail, and well-crafted storytelling make it stand out in the realm of modern entertainment.
Needless to say, if we get more sci-fi films in the future like Villenueve’s Dune 2, I will be a very, very happy camper.
If any of you have thoughts, feel free to share! And if you haven't gotten out to see it, I highly recommend you check it out while it's still in theaters.
Comments
Chalon Hutson
I'm late to the response but I'm very appreciative you give in-depth thoughts to us here! It's been a couple years since I read the book (and that was my first time) so you are bringing up several points I forgot about. One thing about Villenueve removing Alia as a child, I think is probably a very good decision specifically for the medium of film. Even though it's likely they could've gotten somebody to do an adult voice for a child actor, it would be tough to find a 6 year old (or however old Alia was in the books at the time) to act and behave like an adult convincingly. Also, it's simply just a strange and weird concept that would've freaked people out more than made them think/wonder. I do like how they hinted that she was going to be a full grown adult in Part 3 by showing her as Anya Taylor Joy in that one vision of Paul's. Also, Villenueve still kept the weirdness and compelling idea that Alia (along with other ancestor's I assume) could communicate with Jessica while in the womb. This gets across the point of how powerful Alia will be when she is born, along with forshadows how she will be abomination in Part 3 as well.
Sarah Roop-Rosales
Confession I have never seen or read anything Dune 🫣 I have only ever watched videos about it.
Martin Ridgway
This podcast was interesting on the topic: have a listen ... https://open.spotify.com/episode/1JlY78tJNV6WdjmFAT2Kc3?si=0057017b299540f0
Cynthia
100k subscribers! Congratulations Jess!
Matt Miller
Darn, hit enter too soon. It is visually gorgeous. You MUST see this on the biggest screen and loudest theater you can. The sandworm ride was stunning. The acting was fantastic. I really liked how Chani had much more depth / dimension than the book. I definitely place this alongside my other favorite adaptations (Harry Potter and Peter Jackson's Middle Earth movies). I saw this movie with a guy that knew nothing about the books; had only partially understood the first movie, and he loved Part 2. See this movie!
Matt Miller
So, I absolutely loved this movie. This is what movies (especially sci-fi/fantasy movies) should be. I think you nailed it, Lady Jessica, that this is an excellent adaptation.
MAThompson
This was my comment about it on Facebook right after taking my son to see it, and a couple of days before I saw your video. So, I just watched Dune: Part Two. I recommend it very highly, at least for them that have read the book. There were some significant changes from the book, yes, but I'm no purist on adaptations of books to film. One of the two biggest changes in my view was to Jessica's character, showing more of her Bene Gesserit-hood and her machinations to her own ends against the order's. That allowed them to bring out Herbert's socio-religious themes quite well, and more to the point highlighted the conflicts Paul faced. This you'd HAVE to do to adapt the book successfully in any case, since so much of that is shown in the book through interior dialogue and the like. The casting is excellent, the filmography is spectacular (the Harkkonen-based scenes are compellingly spectacular and utterly grotesque and disturbingly depraved all at once, just like the Harkkonen themselves), and they did a very good job retaining the core of the book. More than that, I agreed completely with one change in particular. Spoiler: At the end Chani is not reconciled with Paul. There's none of that saccharine crap where Jessica tells her, "While we, Chani, we who carry the name of concubine--history will call us wives." Even to a particularly shallow 9-year-old like me, that struck a completely false note when I read it the first time, and it has never gotten any more believable, so yes, the ending of the movie is much better in that respect, and if it means we get another few movies like this, then all the better! Also, how can you resist a movie in which Christoper Walken is the emperor?!? Also, how could I in particular resist a movie in which the languages were created by one of my Speculative Grammarian co-conspirators?!? All props to David J. Peterson!!! (The middle initial is necessary because there is another linguist of some renown differing only in the middle initial.) The big problem I have is not with the movie but with the book. It always makes me feel like laughing sardonically when people say it is a great novel for its world-building, and especially its grasp of ecology. No. It does have compelling world-building, but that's because Herbert cooked the book, as it were. It has in fact an extraordinarily simple ecosystem that Does. Not. Work. and that Would. Not. Work. in any world lacking pure magic. As the famous book title says, "big fierce animals are rare," yet these sandworms are so dang numerous they can be used reliably as military transports for whole armies. What do they live on? The occasional desert mouse? And more than that, I read Dune for the first time after I'd read D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson's On Growth and Form, because I was a very weird kid. Animals are physical systems shaped by physical laws. Imagine the energy intake a whale needs. And whales are just pushing themselves through water. Just imagine (or better, calculate) how much energy intake they'd need to push through sand like whales. WHAT DO THEY EAT?!? And you even see a baby worm in the movie, and it is no whale. It's just like the alien in Alien--how'd it get so darn big in 24 hours?!? Mass is conserved, and to pack it into tissue, a massive flow of low-entropic chemical energy is needed as well. WHAAAAT DOOOO THEEEEY EEEEAT?!? The only possible answer is "A wizard feeds them," in this case a wizard named Frank Herbert. (Though at least it's not as obtrusively stupid an abandonment of conservation of mass and energy as that appallingly stupid Korean production "A Calm Sea." That was so dumb I couldn't even hate-watch more than seven episodes, it made my head hurt so much.) And that brings up one more hobby horse--if you really want exciting stories with more realistic ecologies, why not adapt something by James H. Schmitz? (Among many possibilities.) They're very fun, they have really good plots, and you'd have the plus that he created at least three of the best young heroines in SF before the 1980s. (I do not know for sure, but I strongly suspect he had at least one daughter who grew up hearing really exciting bedtime stories created just for her that he later wrote up and sold to John Campbell.) Granted, you'd have to update some parts of the stories, especially the fact that so many of his characters smoke like factory chimneys, because the 60s were the 60s, after all. The Demon Breed would be great if you could adapt it well--a whole alien invasion stopped by a resourceful young woman marine biologist using psychological warfare and knowledge of the environment she was studying, and doing so supremely well, plus you'd get genetically engineered super-intelligent otters, which would be worth full-priced admission right there. And finally, I read Dune probably four times in elementary and middle school, then read it one again late in grad school. (I tried the second book three times and made it no further than 15 pages in each time. I'm not a Herbert fanboy, in other words.) What I didn't really notice as a wee one that really stood out rereading it [mumble mumble] decades later--and which you see clearly in the movie--is just how fundamentally weird parts of the story are. The neo-feudal trappings, the well-lived-in high-tech, the Realpolitik, the well-drawn social scenes, the compelling story, and the interesting characters--they all do an excellent job lulling your mind into not noticing the goofy weirdnesses around the edges (age-old memories passed down through the lineages, psychic communication with a fetus, all that jazz) that creep into the very center at the end that are basically magic. (Which reminds me that the first book was also bought by John Campbell, who despite his scientific bent and trappings really loved his old-fashioned magic candy-coated with bafflegab gloss, whether ESP, dianetics, or anything else that allowed him to indulge technocratic wish-fulfillment fantasies.) A wizard did it, a wizard named Frank Herbert, and his greatest act of magic was making the whole thing compellingly palatably believable.
William Palmer
It's always hard to adapt a story that has a lot of internal monologue, and I'm glad to know Villeneuve wisely chose to work around the problem. I think the weakest part of Lynch's version is all the voice-over, which often crosses over to melodrama. I'm looking forward to seeing this - thanks for your thoughts on it!
