Dune is a very strange, vicious, beautiful place, from a very renowned series of novels by Frank Herbert and his son. Book fans and sci-fi aficionados should already be familiar with this fantastic franchise full of otherworldly planets and empires, of fremen and sandworms, and the spice melange.
This 1984 film is an attempt to adapt Frank Herbert's deep and dense story into a palpable format. At the time of its release, the film was a massive flop, and it has garnered its fair share of complaints. So much so that even director David Lynch condemned the film as his biggest failure, and has effectively disowned it. The biggest issues are that the film is gaudy, messy, and pretentious. Chances are that if the world of Dune doesn't captivate you, these issues will beat you over your head, and you'll walk away thinking the film overly long and dull.
Dune does captivate me, however. From start to finish, it dishes out a plethora of fantastic imagery, thanks to its strange array of baroque props and costumes, its elaborate settings, it the story overall. David Lynch manages to squeeze in a few of his signature freak-out scenes, with strange images and scenes overlaid over each other in surreal montages, mostly during dream and spice-induced sequences. The man also tends to focus a lot on strange and grotesque details, many of which are so weird and out-there that they might seem out of place or unintentionally funny. And yet, that's one of the things I love about this film: the strangeness of it. I believe it's immensely successful at being otherworldly, and I feel that's most appropriate for Dune.
This film's pacing can be a hit or a miss though. The first half is entirely devoted to House Atreides settling on Arrakis, and these scenes can be rather dry. The more interesting segments occur in the last half, with the fremen uprising against House Harkonnen. There are big, epic battles at key moments, but they are pretty short, and special effects are of such mixed quality that it can be distracting (the biggest gripe I have is that many guns go off without producing any visible beams or bolts). What really makes this film interesting will be the individual scenes involving the characters and their journey.
That brings me to the most important aspect to this film: the story. Fans of the book may complain that the film swaps out "desert power" with weirding modules, thus undermining the tactical prowess of the characters. However, I feel the movie does the book decent justice, especially in the overall tone and style. A lot from the story and characters are lost between the book and the movie, but the fundamentals remain. On its own merits, the movie is not hard to follow, even with its vast array of Dune lore laid out. The plot is sound and interesting, and there's just enough to the characters to make them endearing. As the plot and characters progress, themes of destiny are strongly enforced.
On a cinematic level, the film is superbly constructed, with quality photography and very vivid editing. A few shots appear cheap, especially with some special effects appearing incomplete or gaudy, but other effects are great. Acting is very strong all around: Kyle MacLachlan is especially powerful and commanding as Paul Atreides. I enjoyed the performances of Francesca Annis, Sean Young, Jose Ferrer, Brad Dourif, Linda Hunt, Dean Stockwell, and Max Von Sydow. Kenneth McMillan is extremely hammy as the baron, and I love him that way. Sting offers a brief and gratuitous cameo, but he delivers a deliciously fun performance as Feyd Rautha, and he delivers one of the best psychotic smiles of all time. Writing can be a hit and a miss; I love a lot of the lines, but some of them are dumb, and there is a ton of exposition (especially regarding voice-overs, which are used to death here, and probably aren't necessary). This production uses some very elaborate, very interesting, and very big sets, props, and costumes. The music, by the rock band Toto, is really awesome and epic, and is one of my favorite music scores.
This adaptation of Dune has its share of issues that hasn't sat well with many viewers. However, it is a big, sweeping, epic sci-fi adventure with a very interesting universe. The film has a strong emotional power in its presentation, and that alone has cemented it as a personal favorite of mine, despite all its problems. For the open-minded sci-fi fans, I recommend giving this film a try. For an alternative adaptation, however, the Sci-Fi Channel miniseries Frank Herbert's Dune should be worth a look as well.
David Lynch's Dune has an extended cut available on DVD, which runs for about three hours. There is a wealth of interesting new scenes, but this version is very cheaply edited, it has a terrible prologue, the pacing is substantially slower, and since it was made for TV, all the bloody scenes were cut out. I personally prefer the theatrical cut, but the extended edition is worth seeing for fans.
5/5 (Entertainment: Very Good | Story: Very Good | Film: Perfect)
This film currently appears on my list of Top 100 Favorite Movies at #36, and my Top 100 Favorite Guilty Pleasure Movies at #4.
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