Something to watch tonight: Wednesday 28 February

Dune (Villeneuve, 2021)

With Dune: Part Two – the follow-up to Dune (now known as Dune: Part One) – arriving in cinemas tomorrow, I thought it might be useful to revisit the first film prior to reviewing the new one for subscribers and RNZ listeners on Friday.

Monday night was actually my third viewing. In 2021 I didn’t get assigned it as a review gig, so watched it as a civilian.

Then at Christmas 2022 I rented the 4K disc from Christchurch’s Alice in Videoland but – because Christmas – I’d had a few drinks and was most intent on showing off the home cinema battlestation to invited guests so I don’t remember it as well as I might have.

(That 4K disc is still the gold standard for home theatre presentation. The DolbyVision mastering and the DolbyAtmos sound are absolutely state-of-the-art. Until Dune 2, this is the one you use to show off your system.)

So, more than a year later, I felt like I needed an update – and a reminder of the machinations of the plot – so here are some third impressions.

It’s hard to separate the spectacle from the experience as so much of the film’s reason for existing is the ability to create – in spectacular fashion – the various worlds of Frank Herbert’s imagination.

Jodorowsky’s version may well have been more psychedelic, leaning into the idea of ‘spice’ as a psychoactive agent as well as fuel for the galactic economy, but Villeneuve’s vision seems mostly physical. The machines, the buildings, the creatures all have a tactility to them – a solidity. The brutalist concrete constructions on Arrakis seem to have been built using 20th century Earth-like wooden formwork, begging the question – from where did they obtain the timber? Or the water for the concrete?

No matter.

There’s a spiritual side to the story, of course. A mystical religious order of women known as the Bene Gesserit seem to be a ‘force’ behind various interstellar machinations that are clearly not meant to be seen in an entirely positive light.

And the various ‘houses’ – Atreides, Harkonnen, others we are yet to meet – despite operating on a grand scale, are simply middle-managers being played off against each other by a distant CEO whose motives can only be guessed at.

Relatable.

Anyway, the film works as an interesting set up for some big themes, while still having a solid amount of drama and spectacle.

The rewatch confirmed for me that Timothée Chalamet can hold my interest on screen when he has the right material, that casting Oscar-nominees and Oscar-winners in relatively small roles pays dividends, and that a clean-shaven Jason Momoa cuts a very striking figure, indeed.

Stay tuned for my review of the next instalment.

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Where to watch Dune