A new film adaptation of Frank Herbert’s Dune was always gamble. It’s a classic novel whose stature and massive scope for years made it almost unfilmmable. David Lynch attempted in 1984, making both one of the most gloriously weird science fiction films ever and also a giant box office bomb. It’s a strange book filled with political maneuvering, space drugs, and yes, giant worms. Additionally, so much of pop culture borrows from Dune, especially Game of Thrones and Star Wars, would theatergoers care? Could this novel be wrangled into a coherent film that mainstream audiences would watch?
Denis Villeneuve, in a similar way as Peter Jackson did with J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, brought Dune to cinematic life in 2021, or at least the first half of the book. The director of Arrival and Blade Runner 2049 brought a sweeping, almost Romantic take to the material as Arrakis and galactic politics destroyed House Atreides. It was a gorgeous looking film, thanks to Grieg Fraser’s Academy Award winning cinematography and the incredible, brutalist production design. Also helping was the all star cast led by Timothée Chalamet as the book’s protagonist Paul Atreides.
Yet the fall of House Atreides is only half of that novel and now comes Dune Part Two. As gorgeous as the first film was, it felt safe. The stamp of strangeness that makes Dune such a singular book felt sanded down. However emboldened by the first film’s success, Villeneuve, along with co-writer Jon Spaihts, have crafted a stranger, darker film in Dune Part Two. It brings back the spirit of Herbert’s novel, a cautionary tale of following charismatic leaders that also has political maneuvering, space drugs, and of course, giant worms. Chronicling the rise of Paul Muad’Dib Atreides is a story of victory at a dark cost.
Villeneuve allows more of the book’s weirdness to seep into his filmmaking. The film opens with the fetus of Paul’s sister, looking very much like the Star Child from 2001: A Space Odyssey, who starts taking a larger role throughout the film. Rebecca Ferguson’s Lady Jessica spends most of the film talking to her unborn child while scheming to make her son emperor. Paul Atriedes’ dreams seeping more and more into his waking life. Characters actively take drugs. One person wrestles a worm. While not a far cry from the previous film, the touches of strangeness are definitely welcome.
Once again, Villeneuve and cinematographer Fraser are content with a less is more visual approach. There’s two scenes, the gladiator battle on Geidi Prime and the Beast Rabban (Dave Bautista) hunting the Fremen in a storm, that stand out in their use of limited color schemes. When the film is huge though, like the climactic battle sequence, Villeneuve never makes the film seem cheap. This is a big film in a way films don’t really get to be big anymore. It’s a film that demands to be seen on a big screen.
In this film though many of the visuals from the previous film feel more oppressive. The desert remains beautiful but you feel the heat and isolation of it. The brutalist architecture that made up sets looked minimalist and modern in the first film now becomes oppressive. Dune Part Two is a film about cultures oppressed on all sides.
What’s fascinating about Dune Part Two is how willing Villeneuve is to portray all sides struggling for power as tryannical. Part One framed the Atreides as heroes liberating Arrakis before the evil Harkonnens and Emperor Shaddam IV stopped them. By sanding down the political maneuvering, Part One stole some of the books political power. Part Two returns that to the film’s subtext. Arrakis is not a place to be liberated. It’s simply an arena for the culmination of the Bene Gesserit’s centuries spanning plan. In Part Two, when Paul accepts his invented role of messiah to the Fremen and Arrakis, Chani (Zendaya) screams the prophecy is a tool of their oppressors. Some people want their messiah, while others know it’s a tool to further their goals. No one wants to listen to a single voice of reason when a messiah promises you the universe.
Villeneuve and Spaihts wisely make Zendaya’s Chani the point of view character in this film. Zendaya was an overqualified actress in the previous film whose sole purpose was being Paul Atreides’ dream girl. Thankfully she gets a lot more to do in this story. Her Chani is a woman dedicated to the freedom of Arrakis. This is a person who fought the Harkonnens for years, seeing family and friends butchered by the tyrants. The Paul Atreides she mentors and grows to love at the beginning of the film is a young man who suffered similarly. The Paul Muad’Dib she sees when he ascends to the throne is a born tyrant. This is the story of a woman who watches a man become a myth and rejects him for it.
Timothée Chalamet in the first film came across as a lightweight, the least interesting cast member in an all star line-up. Then again, Paul in the first part of Dune is not much a character. In part two though, he sells Paul Atreides’ transformation from nobody prince to terrifying and charismatic emperor of the galaxy. His Paul Atriedes is not the heir to a noble duke wronged by their rivals but a boy driven by revenge to wipe out his father’s killers. He conveys the weight and foreknowledge of Paul Atriedes’ terrible purpose. The moment he accepts it becomes not a moment of triumph but one of dread. His rise to emperor is not a moment of glorious destiny but an inevitable nightmare. Paul’s story in Dune Part Two is one of revenge not liberation.
The most interesting performances come from the players on the edges though. Rebecca Ferguson’s Lady Jessica is as much prophet as a woman driven mad, in both sense of the word, by grief. There’s humor and horror anytime she talks to her daughter. Javier Bardem portrays Stilgar as a fanatic waiting for a messiah and willing to play mentor to push Paul into that role. Once Paul achieves it, he’s no longer a mentor but a blind follower. A man ready to carry out a cosmic jihad.
Like Zendaya in the last film, Florence Pugh doesn’t get to do much as Princess Irulan. In her few scenes, it’s still fun seeing her assess the situation and wait for which side to come out on top.
Maybe the most surprising performance is Austin Butler. Even though the bald look of the Harkonnens does him no favors, it’s hard not to be drawn in by Butler’s performance as the monster Feyd-Rautha. He slithers around the screen, ready to kill anyone on a whim. Feyd-Rautha is supposed to be Paul’s opposite and Butler portrays him as simply a different shade of monster than Paul. Feyd-Rautha may be a crueler monster but he and Paul Atreides have the same hunger for power and control. Also props to Butler for doing his best to mimic Stellan Skarsgård’s delivery as the Baron. His ability as a vocal mimic, as anyone who’s seen Elvis can attest, is impressive.
The sole drawback but not one that makes the film slightly less enjoyable is knowing the film is only part two of a planned trilogy. Dune Part Two fully works as its own story, the rise of Paul Atreides. However, if you know the source material you know where it’s going. A knowledgeable audience can see the seeds laid down for the final film, an adaptation of Dune Messiah. If anything, seeing those seeds, including an intriguing bit of casting, only makes someone want that film to come out sooner.
Dune Part Two truly is a sequel that outdoes its predecessor. The film doesn’t lose the sense of visual majesty, scale, and ambition demonstrated by the first film. If anything, Denis Villeneuve only builds on that film by more fully embracing the source material. It’s weird and political in ways the first film wasn’t. As a filmmaker, he’s willing to embrace the darkness in a story about the allure of revenge and the corruption of a man’s soul. This is what big budget science fiction and literary adaptations should strive to be.
Director: Denis Villeneuve
Writer: Denis Villeneuve and Jon Spaihts
Starring: Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, Austin Butler, Rebecca Ferguson, Javier Barden, Josh Brolin, Dave Bautista, Florence Pugh, Stellan Skarsgård, and Christopher Walken
Distributor: Warner Bros. Discovery
Dune Part Two arrives in theaters Friday March 1st.
