FILMS OF 2021: DUNE PART ONE

 DUNE

So, that's Dune done. Saw it last night. A film I've been aching to see for a year.

I've listened to the audible book, rewatched the Lynch version in anticipation.

It's a long film, a deeply serious film, with a great cast, great acting, a well-written script, it adapts the book extremely well, the space ships and set designs and all that are glorious. I admired it's scope, its languid pace, the acting and all that, BUT...

Why the hell did it all have to be shot in sepia? Just a sea of orange and browns, everything looked so murky and gloomy.

Several years ago, there was a depressing trend for shaky cam and violent editing in action films, then we had that fad for never having a static camera, as if every movie was a fly on the wall documentary and now it seems we can't have a science fiction film unless it's gloomy, murky and bleached of colour.

You, or should I say 'one', can't help but compare it with the flawed 1984 Lynch version and realise how much he got right. His film, the part that works is, what we get here, Paul and his family arriving on Dune and ending up with the Fremen. The difference here is that rather than shoehorn all that into a single hour, Denis Villeneuve has 155 minutes to do the same.

Apart from that, the film is exactly what I wanted. But be warned you have to invest in it, my son feels you need to have read the book to fully understand it and judging by the number of walk outs, mostly from people with kids, and teenagers, he might have a point.

And even though Denis The Vill-nace has 155 minutes, it still feels as if he's rushed some of this, particularly in setting up Paul and the abilities his mother has given him.

This is another meaty, solid 'hard' science fiction film and I look forward to watching it again, although next time, probably at home, with the brightness and contrast turned up high.

8/10