A Review of Dune

Denis Villeneuve is at the helm of this movie adaptation of the popular sci fi series Dune. Denis shows this film differently than it appears in the books to help the newcomer to the series, this however does not take away any of the impact made.

The story follows a universe that is many millenniums into the future; this world has many extreme advances in technology such as “defense shields”, light travel and many other things considered “otherworldly”.

The empire the story is told within is split into different houses which control different planets. For this story, the main house we follow is House Atreides, ruled by Duke Leto, played by Oscar Issac, and his wife Lady Jessica, played by Rebecca Ferguson. Their son Paul Atreides, who is played by Timothee Chalamet, is considered to be “The Messiah” and is understood to be the main character in this movie. Duke Leto’s way of rule is guided by his advisors Duncan Idaho, played by Jason Momoa, and Gurney Halleck, played by Josh Brolin.

The setting bounces back and forth between different worlds, but the main one is plant Arrakis, a desert planet which is rich in an extremely valuable resource called spice, which is held within the desert dunes. Spice is used for space travel and is also a hallucinogenic which can give you visions and can create mutations to humans. House Atreides is sent to Arrakis to oversee the mining operation of spice. The last occupants of this planet who used to mine spice was the evil House Harkonnen, the rival of House Atreides. This task is made difficult for Duke Leto, as he as to maintain the rate spice production the Harkonnen had done and also keep peace with the native people named the Fremen (the humans with mutations) who were previously oppressed and slaughtered by the Harkonnen. If he fails this task, his house will fall. That is as far as I can go without giving any sorts of spoilers. But now that you’ve got the general gist we can move onto the review.

Let’s go over the positives. One of the main things this movie excels in is its visual presentation (and conceptual designs). This is truly the most beautiful movie I’ve ever seen: the scenery is incredible and unmatched, the scale of everything is portrayed with greatness and it truly makes you feel small compared to the things on the screen. No matter what shot it is, the lighting, the actors positioning, the foreground, and background is all planned out and thought out and I give major props to the cinematographer Greg Fraser who made some of the most beautiful scenes in a movie I’ve ever seen. Something that is right along there with the visuals is the sounds design and music, every sound feels real and when combined with the triumphant music composed by mastermind Hans Zimmer, who made music in Interstellar, The Dark Knight, and Inception, makes this movie feel almost overwhelming. When you watch this movie, some scenes have incredible scenery, amazing sound design, and a heart pounding score leaves you speechless, and I believe that is the strongest suit of this movie.

I could go on all day about this movies visuals and score but I’ll move onto the characters who all make a large impact on the story; I do not believe there is a single small character in this film that doesn’t light up the screen when they walk on it- the highlight obviously being the performance put on by Timothee Chalamet, who, before this movie, I truly was not impressed by any of his work, but in this his emotional and meaningful performance is absolutely incredible. But that’s not to say he doesn’t steal the light from the other characters. Other highlights include Oscar Issac, who plays Duke Leto, and Rebecca Ferguson, who plays Lady Jessica. Both are great actors and have great chemistry with Timothee Chalamet. The way all these characters are written are perfect; all feel like the actor was made for their role. There is not a single moment within this movie where I wasn’t fully immersed within this world and it leaves me wanting more.

Now I have to go over some of the weaker elements because unfortunately this movie isn’t perfect, like most. Plot is lacking in some parts, whether it be not fully explaining something that’s happening, not understanding elements of the film, or you leaving the theater feeling it was incomplete. The purpose for this movie was purely to set up the sequel Dune: Part II and that’s not always a bad thing but in this case it felt as if the story told so far was just somewhat unfinished. Once again that’s not a terrible thing but for a two and a half hour movie you’d expect a somewhat finished story from it but unfortunately this movie just did not accomplish that.

This movie is an immersive experience that will take you through many worlds and show the lives of many characters. These worlds that are shown are incredible, every scene is amazing and I do believe no other movie has accomplished what Dune had done on this scale. One great thing is that the acting is fantastic, no actor takes away from the immersive experience and I praise each and every one of them for that, and while the writing in some parts may of been a little lacking they still worked with it. One of the major things was the score, what an incredible piece of art the composer Hans Zimmer has created with this movie, the sound design goes right along with that, each sound feels real and I love that. However even after all that I can help but feel this movie is unfinished, after two and a half hours I would want a complete experience but you don’t get that from this unfortunately. After all this, my final rating for Dune is a 8/10, which I believe is a perfect score for this film.

Everyone should see this film for themselves. If you do, please see it in the theaters and even better in IMAX, seeing on a TV will not do justice for this film whatsoever.