Will the third try be the charm for a movie version of Frank Herbert's Dune? Indiewire reported a few months ago:
With “Blade Runner 2049” behind him, Denis Villeneuve is gearing up for “Dune” and he isn’t hiding the fact he has some big plans in store for his adaptation of Frank Herbert’s 1965 novel. The director appeared at the Rendez-Vous du Cinema Quebecois this week (via The Playlist) where he revealed to the audience that “Dune” is going to be more than just a one-off tentpole.
“’Dune’ will probably take two years to make,” Villeneuve said. “The goal is to make two films, maybe more.”
The franchise plans are all Villeneuve is willing to tease right now, but multiple films sounds fitting considering Herbert’s novel is over 400 pages and incredibly dense. David Lynch’s infamous 1984 adaptation struggled to tell the entire story in just over two hours. As The Playlist notes, there’s a significant time jump in the middle of “Dune,” which would more or less be the ideal place to split the film adaptation into two parts. Warner Bros. did something similar with their “It” movie adaptation....
The director has referred to “Dune” as the movie he’s been wanting to make since he was a child. He previously warned that his take would greatly differ from Lynch’s version.
“David Lynch did an adaptation in the ’80s that has some very strong qualities. I mean, David Lynch is one of the best filmmakers alive, I have massive respect for him,” Villeneuve said in November 2016. “But when I saw his adaptation, I was impressed, but it was not what I had dreamed of, so I’m trying to make the adaptation of my dreams. It will not have any link with the David Lynch movie. I’m going back to the book, and going to the images that came out when I read it.”... Rest of article.
The Lynch production was ambitious but flawed. The stellar cast was betrayed the the studio's decision to shorten the movie to a little more than two hours. The plot was changed to include the idiotic weirding modules storyline. The Harkonnens were turned into cartoon characters when they were much more devious and dangerous in the books. The Sci-Fi Channel production was more true to the books but the cast was really sub-par.
It is is heartening to see a direcotr of Villeneuve's quality attempt to tackle Dune yet again. Unfortunately for him, Frank Herbert's son, Brian, will be the executive producer. He managed to take a science fiction masterpiece and butcher and bastardize it with a series of prequels and sequels. A Nazi-style book-burning of those books would not erase the sins that were committed against the Father on their pages.
However, one can hope against hope that Mr. Herbert will stay out of Villeneuve's way and that Dune will finally receive the cinematic portrayal it deserves.
8 comments:
"He managed to take a science fiction masterpiece and butcher and bastardize it with a series of prequels and sequels. A Nazi-style book-burning of those books would not erase the sins that were committed against the Father on their pages."
Am I to take it from your words that you didn't care for the prequels and sequels? After reading your comments I would certainly like to know what you really thought.
Oh by the way, I agree with the comment you made that I copied above. I always said that coming soon would be the latest book of the series - "The First McDonalds on Dune".
Having said all of this, it will be very interesting to see what they do with this latest attempt to put Dune on the screen. I would go see it if it was 20 hours long and I had to pay for ten tickets to go see it.
Nerd alert!!! Y’all so lame
If you haven't seen Jodorowsky's Dune, you need to. It's about an ambitious attempt to film Dune in the mid 70s. Much of the artwork for that film wound up in Lynch's production or other iconic films like Blade Runner and Alien.
I still love the David Lynch production. Chaaaaaaaaaaa-SOO!
I learned about Dune from the Sci-Fi channel. They aired the extended edition which I taped and watched repeatedly as a kid. Years later I finally read the novel and decided that I preferred the extended David Lynch movie. Now it even stands on its own as an 80's classic.
Fear is the mind-killer
Take out that weirding module crap and its a much better movie. Lynch did not have final cut authority so it got butchered. Not as bad as Guccione editing Caligula himself but you get the idea. Production value was great, had a distinct British feel to it, opposite of the Star Wars type productions of the time. Just too much to cram into a two hour movie.
Al Franken as the Baron. He is big, fat, very gay, and a sociopathic liar.
Dune to me will always have a special place because of the Westwood Real-Time Strategy games on PC and home consoles.
StarCraft
Dune
Command & Conquer
If you like RTS games you must get a copy of a Dune RTS.
Like it or not, but Dune is the classic example of a what the TV mini-series ought to be about. The earlier Sci-Fi channel attempt was below par, but the medium is perfect for a story that will take a minimum of 8 hours to do justice. No matter how ambitious the pre production talk might be, the Hollywood studio bean counters are going to cut the guts out of any movie that goes beyond the time necessary to make it "marketable" to the impatient masses. If the first installment doesn't hit a home run, there won't be a second or third. I'll take my chances with one very good redux mini-series.
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